Winter Shadows
by Aqua Lion
Summary: A mysterious blizzard sends two nighttime excursions right off the rails. Velma never knew her comfort zone could be shattered so easily; Joe always knew his was pretty shaky. Too bad they have nothing in common... except for dogs and clues.
1. Into the Night

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 1: Into the Night

_Y'know... it's got to be some sort of crime that nobody's done this crossover already. Set right after Where's My Mummy for Scooby Doo, because Velma needs to get rid of that Idiot Ball she got stuck with. And shortly post-Steve for Blue's Clues, because Joe needs love too.  
__(Reading my other BC fic, Believing In Magic, will make some of this make more sense, but it shouldn't be necessary.)_

_

* * *

_

It was nearly midnight when she slipped out of the hotel. The wind blasted her as soon as she stepped out the door and she cringed—it was really only in the fifties, but the wind chill was killer. _Should've brought a coat. Oh well... _she wasn't about to go back in now. Someone might see her.

Velma paused on the sidewalk just in front of the door and shook her head, irritated. Had it really come to this? Sneaking around like a criminal in hopes of dodging her best friends? Really, how _had_ this mess started?

Oh, wait. She knew how this mess had started, and it was her own fault, so... right.

They weren't actually following her—or at least, if they were, they were doing a pretty good job of staying hidden. She doubted it. It was just a little hard not to be paranoid under the current circumstances.

_What's there for _you_ to be paranoid about? You're the one that caused all the problems._

The dark voice in the back of her mind fell silent as her eyes narrowed. It was true, of course—it was what had driven her out here, and what had her convinced she was being watched. The gang _should_ be keeping an eye on her. They shouldn't really trust her, not anymore. Not after...

_Oh sheesh. Come off it._

Telling herself to drop the subject didn't help, so she started walking. She didn't know her way around this city; wasn't even sure of its name. The gang was on their way to investigate a haunted house on the west coast—this was just a stopping point. One of many. How many places had they gone through in search of mysteries, anyway? She could never quite be bothered to pay attention when there weren't clues to be found. Especially not lately when she had her own sulking to concentrate on.

She located a small park on the outskirts of the town and flopped onto a bench. _Much better._ It was late, she was tired, but the wind chill kept her mostly alert. Not that she could sleep anyway—that was why she'd snuck out. Over the last week she'd found herself on a mostly nocturnal schedule, sleeping in the back of the Mystery Machine while they were on the road. It was easier that way.

Velma was angry.

Not at the rest of the gang; not even close. She was angry at herself. Slightly over a month later, half a world away from Egypt, she was still horribly on edge.

Had she _really_ faked her own death to try to scare her friends off? Had she _really_ expected that to work?

Oh, they'd forgiven her. Hell, they didn't seem to have been angry in the first place; maybe they really weren't. Maybe they even bought her ridiculous story about trying to protect them. Because, after the hundreds of monsters—real and fake—that she and the gang had faced off against, of _course_ she'd expected one more ghost to scare them off. _Stupid_. No, that wasn't it at all.

It all went back to another night, another smaller town, though she knew the name of that one all too well. _Oakhaven_. A shudder ran down her spine even now when she thought it. Oakhaven... where she'd learned something about trust. Or perhaps forgotten it. And ever since then, though she tried her best to hide it, nothing had been the same.

The end result? Her stupid attempt to try to keep the rest of the gang out of the mummy ploy, lest they somehow botch the whole thing. Which of course they'd done anyway, since she _hadn't_ let them in on the plan.

Trust was important... she needed to remember that.

So here she was, alone. At this hour, of course, the park was otherwise deserted. Just her and the stars and the heavy footsteps of some animal behind her...

_Wait, what?_

Turning, Velma saw a dark, very familiar shape trotting up, breaking into a run as her eyes locked on it. "Scooby?"

"Relma!" The dog bounded over the back of the bench and landed squarely on top of her, licking her face. "Relma! Ri found roo!"

Velma burst into giggles. She couldn't help it; something about a dog as big as she was pouncing on her made all attempts to keep her composure go out the window. Not that there were any windows out here. "Okay, okay! You found me!" Reaching up and scratching him behind the ears earned her a little bit of breathing space. "Scooby, what're you doing out here?"

"Rooking for roo," he answered promptly.

Velma raised an eyebrow. "Looking for me?" Granted she'd been worried about being followed, but this was not who she'd have expected to have spying on her.

Scooby nodded and hung his head. "Ri got rocked out rooking for a rack... Raggy's rindow was rosed, rhen I raw roo. Ran I rorrow rour rey?"

A fresh fit of giggles washed over the girl. She couldn't help it. So much for paranoia. Of _course_ he'd be outside because of some food-related crisis. And... he'd helped. Despite herself she felt better with Scooby there, just being Scooby. He always had that effect on her. And it was still a bit chilly, so... it felt like she'd barely been out here at all, but Velma decided it really was time to go back in. This time. "Okay, let's head back."

"Rokay!"

Velma stood and turned around, then hesitated. She'd been lost in thought while she was traveling, and hadn't exactly paid attention to where she was going. "Um... Scooby, do you happen to know how to get back to the hotel from here?"

He shook his head. "Ruh-uh, ron't roo? ...Ruh-roh."

* * *

"So if I asked you where we're going... would you tell me?"

"Bow bow bow!"

"You don't know? Okay, that works."

Midnight didn't really seem like the best time for a random trek down the street, Joe mused as he followed the bright blue puppy trotting just ahead of him. Blue didn't seem to share his opinion. She'd insisted on going outside _now_. Fair enough—though he was a little confused as to why they'd come this far out. Surely Blue had noticed when they'd crossed the boundary... or at least that the mailboxes weren't talking anymore.

Now that he thought about it, he was pretty sure Blue hadn't encountered non-talking mailboxes in a very long time. Maybe that was the point.

"Bowbow bowbow bowbow bow... bow! Bowbowbow!" The puppy's barking softly to herself reached a crescendo and she tore off abruptly. "Bowbowbow!"

"Wha—Blue? Blue, come back!" She ignored him, as she tended to do when her mind was set on something, and a flicker of light caught his eye. She'd seen a firefly. "Blue..." _Oh, what's the point?_ A slight grin crossed his face. Joe knew when he was beat. "Blue, wait for me!" And with that he was sprinting into the darkness after her.

When he caught up, Blue was sitting in the middle of the sidewalk with the firefly perched on her nose. The two seemed to be having an animated conversation, if Blue's barks and the firefly's flickers were any sign; no surprise there. When he reached them, the insect fluttered up, flashed its light a few times, then took off into the night again.

Joe patted the puppy's head as she turned her attention back to him. "Having fun?"

"Bow!"

"So tell me the truth, did you wake me up and bring me outside for a _reason,_ or did you just want to come out and play?"

"Bow bow bowbow."

He chuckled. "That's a reason. Right. I walked into that one." In the months since Steve had left for college, Joe found himself occasionally surprised at how quick-witted Blue could be. Not that he'd ever thought the puppy was stupid, but she _was_ still a puppy.

So much for that. He shrugged it off and tried to get his bearings, and that led to a whole new set of problems.

Joe never felt entirely comfortable in these forays back into the _normal_ world, what those in the world of magic simply referred to as 'the outside.' By rights he should know his way around the city he'd grown up in, but he'd tried to forget most of that... but then, he'd not spent much time on this side of town, and geography had never been his strong suit anyway. So when he looked around and realized he didn't recognize anything around them, his stomach dropped a little. "Um, Blue?"

"Bow?"

"Do you know where we are?"

She cocked her head and looked around, then barked quietly, "Bow-bow."

Uh-oh.

_Well, not much to be done for it._ "May as well keep going then. There's got to be somewhere in town that's open all night, we can get some directions."

"Bow bow!"

"A park? I don't think we'll find any dir... oh." He looked at where Blue was pointing. Definitely a bit high on the grass-to-asphalt ratio, considering they _were_ in the middle of the city. "You'd rather go there than home, huh?"

"Bow!"

_Why not?_ It was just chilly enough to keep him awake, and Blue certainly didn't seem sleepy. "Lead the way!"

* * *

It was a common misconception that geniuses noticed everything. Velma was observant, yes... but she was vulnerable to _not paying attention_ just like anyone else. She'd probably spent five minutes trying to mentally retrace her steps from the hotel, and gotten nowhere at all, when she caught sight of something moving on the other side of the park.

Her first reaction was concern; it was late, and dark, and the place was otherwise deserted...

"Relma, rook! A rog!"

_Oh! _Scooby was right, she realized, looking more closely. The movement was a dog, bounding cheerfully through the grass. Velma relaxed. "Maybe it's got an owner around here too? Doesn't look like a stray," she mused, studying the distant form more carefully. It looked like a puppy.

Bizarrely, in the darkness, the puppy almost looked _blue_.

"Reah, raybe," Scooby agreed. "...Ro rut?"

"So maybe we can ask them for directions."

"Ro, right. Ri'll rask!" With that he broke into a run towards the puppy.

Scooby's flying charges were impressive, and even his human companions tended to get out of the way when he started running at them. Affection was nice, but he _was_ an awfully large dog. So Velma was surprised when the puppy looked up and held its ground, barking enthusiastically as Scooby skidded to a halt just in front of it.

"Bowbow!"

"Rello!"

Velma chuckled and left the two canines to get acquainted, looking around to see if the puppy had an owner anywhere. Her eyes kept being drawn back to the little dog, though. It wasn't just the lighting. It was definitely blue. Surely her eyes couldn't be getting even _worse_, but... who'd ever heard of a blue dog?

Then again, who'd ever heard of a _talking_ dog?

The blue puppy had turned around to bark something in the direction she'd come from, and within a few seconds, a wiry young man in a purple shirt and cargo pants came jogging up, apparently answering the puppy's barks as he did so. "...but, do you _really_ have to run off li... oh! Hi there." This last was directed at Scooby; Velma, while within earshot, was hardly at conversational distance.

"Rello," Scooby answered cheerfully, raising a paw in greeting.

The newcomer did a double take, which wasn't unusual, but recovered quickly. Almost too quickly. "Making new friends?" he inquired of the puppy, kneeling down and scratching its ears.

"Bow!"

"Excellent." He returned his attention to Scooby. "So, um, is anyone here with you? Or maybe you can help... we're kind of lost."

That was not what Velma had wanted to hear.

* * *

Having a conversation with a dog was surreal. That thought amused Joe; talking kittens, alarm clocks, and mailboxes didn't faze him, but a talking dog? _Weird_. At least it was friendly.

It—_he? Certainly sounded like a he_—was giving Joe a somewhat worried look now. "Ruh... ruh-roh." _Definitely a he_. "Reah, we're rost roo."

Interpreting the words took a moment, but Joe got used to it quickly. _Oh. Well that... kind of figures, actually_. The dog had referred to a 'we' though, so surely... he raised his head and caught sight of a small girl watching them. She wore an orange turtleneck, thick glasses, and an expression that could best be described as resigned.

"Bow bowbow," Blue commented lightly. _That's okay_.

"Easy for you to say." He stood and approached the girl in orange. "So I, uh, guess I know what you'll say if I ask you for directions."

She nodded. "I was hoping to ask you the same thing."

_So much for Plan A_. He was about to say something else when a horrific screech of tires and brakes shattered his concentration.

Someone screamed.

At the time, Joe couldn't be certain whether anyone said anything or not. Looking back later, he was quite sure nobody had, yet suddenly they were all running in the direction of the sound. Why? He couldn't say with any certainty. On his part, maybe it was just reflexes; a scream clearly meant someone needed help. And he was pretty used to helping.

Oh, and Blue was running ahead of him. That always tended to get him moving. She was barking, too, which annoyed him, though he wouldn't say so. It wasn't her fault that dogs could hold a conversation at full sprint and humans couldn't.

"Bow? Bow bow bow bow?"

"Did I... see... what?" Breathing was coming much too hard as he ran. He'd played soccer for four years and was still perfectly in shape, but something in the air was... wrong.

"Bow bow." _Guess not_.

It was _cold_. The realization hit hard—it was incredibly cold, and only moments ago it hadn't been. Chilly yes, but nothing like this... it was like the temperature had plunged twenty degrees in twenty seconds. Joe was good at optimism, and this was no different; his first thought was that the frigid air explained why his lungs were burning so badly. "Blue, what'd... you see?"

She gave an animated series of barks—as always when she got too excited, it was impossible to understand a word she said—and glanced down at her left forepaw. Joe _knew_ perfectly well what that was leading to, but it wouldn't really register until quite a bit later. He distracted easily, after all... and in truth, a much more focused individual than Joe would've been distracted by what happened next.

Something white drifted out of the sky in front of him. Something... then several somethings. On a night that had been over fifty degrees five minutes ago, snowflakes were beginning to fall.

There was an instant where Joe nearly lost it. Just a moment, but it was definitely there. He couldn't quite help remembering another night, another park, another snowfall... where he'd been equally lost, his companion had been a duck rather than a dog, and the whole episode had been notably bad for his health. Very bad.

_Get it together. No freaking out around Blue. Steve would _not_ approve_.

Blue, for her part, was barking softly. "Bowwww... bowbow. ...Bow?"

"Yeah, snow?" the girl in the orange sweater muttered—Joe had almost forgotten she was there and jumped, startled. "This is very odd."

"Rhat's a runderstatement," her dog grumbled, earning an annoyed look. "Rhy are re rust randing rin it?"

"...Fair point. Come on, we'd better find some shelter." She motioned for Joe to follow, which surprised him; neither of them had the vaguest clue who the other was. In his own world it would've seemed natural, but on the outside it just seemed weird. Then again, if they were all lost together, they might as well attempt to get un-lost together.

Besides, that bright orange sweater was a pretty good beacon in the darkness, and in the rapidly-intensifying snowstorm. Why _not_ follow it? It wasn't as if he had any better ideas.

* * *

It had all happened so _fast_.

Even while she was looking for somewhere to get out of the snow, Velma found herself desperately trying to get a grip on how this had come about. In less than five minutes, she'd met a stranger with a blue dog, heard a mysterious scream with no apparent source, and gotten caught in a patently impossible weather phenomenon. None of that was actually all that worrisome in itself, but coming together at such a rapid pace was throwing her. Just a little.

She just needed a moment to get her bearings, a little time to think. Then it would be fine. Chaos and making sense of the unknown? That was her element. But there wasn't any time with the snowstorm intensifying at a truly frightening rate.

It was not helping that the others were all following her like she knew what she was doing.

Their mad dash at the sound of the scream had brought the ragtag group to a road, but all the storefronts were dark. She checked a couple of doors; locked, just as she'd expected, which left them with few options. Daphne was the lockpicking expert of the gang, not Velma. Breaking in would probably be frowned upon, even under these circumstances, and she didn't have a cheesy costume handy anyway—

—_Don't even go there._

Sharply cutting herself off before she could start thinking about her last costumed exploits, she headed for a small gap between two of the buildings. If they couldn't get somewhere with a roof, at least the alley's walls would block most of the snow. Not to mention the wind, which was picking up quickly. Absurd as it was, it looked like they were in for a full-scale blizzard.

"Relma, rouldn't we ret rinside?"

"I'm working on that."

"Roh, rokay." Scooby was moving down the alley, checking a couple of side doors that proved to be locked, then he stopped and whimpered a bit. "Rit's rold!"

She chose not to tell him she'd actually noticed that on her own. "We're in about the best place we can be right now, short of being inside..." Which was sort of like saying that if you couldn't escape a burning building, it was best to be in a room with a window. "Let's keep looking." But all it really took was one glance in the direction of the road for her to decide she didn't much want to be out there, either. Everything outside of the alley was a white blur.

Everything inside the alley was rapidly turning into a white blur too, but at least it was _slightly_ better. For now. She could see flickers of blue and purple through the driving snow; their unwitting companions were looking around too, and seemed no more eager to brave the wide-open streets again than Velma was.

_Eventually we have to reach a point where it can't get worse. Pretty soon, at this rate. And once we get there I guess we just kind of curl up and wait for it to be over? ...Not happening. Not a chance. We've lived through zombies and ghosts and aliens, we're not going to give in to a little bad weather._

"Come on!" She beckoned the others over, though waving her arms around like a maniac probably served no purpose beyond making her feel better. "If we just stay here we're going to be trapped outside for the duration." Nothing said they had to go charging into the _middle_ of the road. They could follow the buildings and hope for the best...

"Ri've rot a retter ridea," Scooby declared. He was still sitting by one of the locked doors; if Velma squinted enough she could just make out what he was doing. Trying to pick the lock with one of his claws. But either the blizzard was obscuring his vision too much or the cold was numbing his paws, because he kept slipping. "Ruh... raybe rot."

"Keep trying!" It wasn't a half bad idea, really. Daphne would be proud.

A particularly savage gust of wind blasted through the alley, forcing her to stumble back again, and Scooby yelped and jumped away from the door. She heard the blue puppy barking an odd mix of encouragement and indignation—and, to her surprise, the cowering Great Dane straightened up and returned to his attempts at lockpicking.

_Not bad..._

A click, and Scooby pulled back, looking concerned. "Ruh roh... rit broke." Judging from the fact that his claw looked fine, he could only be talking about the lock itself.

_Okay then. Bad.

* * *

_

This was not good. This was very not good. This was extremely not good. This was less good than any not-good thing _ever. _

...But that might have been understating the case a little.

_Now what was that about getting it together? Yeah. Didn't think so. _It was probably lucky that the wind was so cold, because it was hard to hyperventilate under these conditions. Otherwise Joe was pretty sure he'd be losing it by now, regardless of his brother's approval.

Maybe he was already losing it, just a little more subtly than the term usually indicated. All he was really doing right now was focusing on _not_ losing it, which meant he wasn't being any more useful than he would be if he just snapped...

"Bow bow bow, bow babow!"

_Huh?_ Joe turned in the direction of the sound, eyes wide. No _way_ had he just heard that... he knew exactly what it meant when Blue barked in that rhythm, it just seemed too absurd at this point. What had she even found to skidoo into, out here in the middle of a deserted alley?

Moving up to where the sound had come from, he could barely make out a patch of differently-colored wall. Decidedly green. He couldn't make out anything else through the blizzard, but he had a suspicion_... _he reached out to touch it, and felt his fingers brushing over smooth paper rather than jagged brick. _Of course_. A poster—given the location, probably for a movie or something. And why _not_ a movie poster, anyway? They'd skidooed into pretty much everything else.

If it hadn't been snow he might not have dragged the others along. He had to follow Blue, regardless, but that was _his_ problem. Anyone else... well... no, that wasn't true at all. Snow or no snow, they were most assuredly in a crisis situation here, and if there was a way out he couldn't just take it himself.

Granted he didn't know if this would even work on the outside, but it never hurt to try. No, wrong. It would work. He'd heard Blue bark—he'd have heard her if she'd hit the wall rather than jumping through it—it _had_ to work. "Over here!"

Flashes of orange and brown through the whiteout told him they'd approached, and it was more by sense than sight that he grabbed them by the arms and whirled back to the poster. _No style points for this one. Blue skidoo, I hope we can too!_

He jumped.


	2. Into the Unknown

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 2: Into the Unknown

* * *

The first sensation was blindness. His eyes were closed, though the result was not familiar darkness. He could see. Sort of. Before him was a blur of nothingness... a nothing that was everything, overwhelming his mind and defying any attempts to make sense of the images. So he stopped trying. By now he should know better.

_Here we go again._

Snow. Snow everywhere. He didn't need to see it to feel it. The biting cold surrounded him, seemed to move through him. He tried to move, to warm himself, but everything was sluggish, every thought seemed to take forever. No... his body would not obey his commands, and he was left to be flung about in a sea of chaos.

_Don't panic. It's only a second._

He was freezing, the blood crystallizing in his veins. Shattering. Reflexively he tried to grasp for a way out, a shelter. But _everything_ was shattering, the snow and the cold and himself and most assuredly his composure... he might've cried out if he had a throat left to scream with, but he didn't and so he was silent.

_Keep it together. Keep it together!_

A blur of emerald now, though he still couldn't see it through the nothingness; he _felt_ the green just as he had felt everything else. It was surging into the gaping hole where reality had been moments ago. Driving the ice away. Washing over him, and he could feel the shattered fragments of himself being drawn back together.

_People aren't meant to..._

Warmth. A gentle wind. The reality that had just torn itself to pieces was putting itself back together, with the same agonizing slowness. A roaring in his ears; the world was reclaiming itself, attacking him, forcing him out. The living didn't belong in this twilight realm, the barrier which held worlds apart. He fell...

_People aren't made for this sort of thing!_

The ground hit him.

* * *

And that was pretty much how every skidoo ended. Joe never felt like he was hitting the ground, though intellectually he knew that was how it happened. It just didn't _seem_ that way. More that the ground reached up and slammed into him to return him to awareness. As always he stumbled forward, taking a few moments to regain his balance and his breath.

_Ugh. That one was pretty bad... I think._

Steve had once explained skidooing to him, describing it as flagrant violation of the laws of physics. Yes, it was _definitely_ that. And Joe had once entertained illusions that he would get used to it, but he knew better now. All he could do after three months of practice was recover a little bit faster.

Speaking of recovery...

"Oof!"

"Rowch!"

Turning around was the first time he consciously registered the ground. Thick grass, plenty of weeds. That was fortunate; the two he'd hauled in behind him got a softer landing that way. "Are you two alright?"

"Ruh-uh," the Great Dane whimpered, holding his head in his paws. Joe arched an eyebrow. He'd actually never known a non-human to have trouble with a skidoo before. "Relma, roo rokay?"

"I think so." The girl in the orange sweater sat up, slowly. "Jinkies, what just happened? It felt like..." Then she paused.

Joe knew where that question had been going. He'd never been able to explain the instant of sheer chaos that resulted from crossing the boundary between two worlds. Nor had Steve, who'd had plenty more experience with it. This girl probably wouldn't pull it off either. The moment just slipped away too fast. "Sorry; there wasn't really time to warn you."

"Warn me?" she repeated, cocking her head. Then, "Forget it, better question. Where in the world are we?"

Telling her that they were, strictly speaking, _not_ in the world didn't seem like a good idea. Joe looked around. Definitely a jungle, and definitely not a snowflake in sight. That was something, anyway. "I didn't really see what the poster was for. You know... whiteout conditions." But if Blue had decided to jump in first, she might know more. "Hey Blue, where..." He trailed off, eyes darting over the trees.

Blue wasn't _there_.

"Blue?" he called out, trying to keep a slight waver out of his voice. _Relax. She'll be fine. She runs off like this all the time, doesn't she? Worry about you._ He grimaced at the thought, feeling guilty, though it was probably correct. Blue could take care of herself, and wouldn't have run off otherwise. He probably _should_ be a little more concerned about himself and these two strangers.

But still. Blue...

The girl was giving him a very odd look now. "I didn't quite follow that. Poster?"

_Oh. Right. Outside. Oops._ "There was a movie poster in the alley. We jumped into the picture."

"...We're inside a picture?"

"Uh-huh." He shifted his gaze to the ground; it was easier. _Nice job. This is the _outside!_ You learned your lesson about this in kindergarten, remember? Don't tell anyone your best friend's a mailbox, don't mention alarm clocks that're learning to count, and don't say anything about jumping into pictures. It. Never. Ends. Well._

"You jump into pictures on a regular basis?"

_Well, you've gone this far_. "Actually yes."

Long pause, as girl and dog exchanged glances, and then both stared at him. _Fantastic_.For an instant it was his first day of school all over again, and he was certain it would go down just as badly.

Before he could remove himself from the situation, or really do much of anything beyond mentally scolding himself, the girl adjusted her glasses and shrugged. "Won't be the strangest thing we've ever done." And then she stuck out her hand. "My name's Velma. And this," she gestured to the Great Dane, "is Scooby Doo."

_...Well then._

He shook the hand she'd offered. "I'm Joe. And the puppy's name is Blue, although..." His dark eyes scanned the jungle again, still hoping to see a ball of blue fur pounce on him, but no such luck. "No idea where she's disappeared to..."

Velma frowned thoughtfully and looked around as well. "She, um, jumps into pictures a lot also?"

"It's usually her idea."

"Works for me." And with that, she turned her attention entirely to their surroundings. "So let's have a look around. Maybe we'll find her."

Joe shrugged; it was all the same to him, at least until Blue turned up, and he was just as happy if the girl stayed focused on _anything_ other than asking him questions. But he noticed that Scooby seemed unenthusiastic. Velma was already on the move, so he dropped back to talk to the dog—after all, he was good at talking to dogs. He just didn't normally expect them to talk back. "Something wrong?"

"Rot yet," Scooby replied gloomily, and trudged after his human companion.

_O...kay_. Quite confident he was missing something, but too lost in his own concerns to really care, Joe followed.

* * *

Velma was not Fred.

That was a patently obvious fact, but she kept reminding herself of it as she moved through the rain forest. Rain forest. Really? Screams and freak blizzards she could deal with. Both could have a myriad of rational, logical explanations. Abruptly going from freak blizzard to rain forest was a little bit more difficult.

Logic or no logic, Velma liked to think she wasn't given to denial, as Fred—for all his admirable traits—definitely was. To that end, she was desperately trying to convince herself to believe what she'd been told about having jumped into a movie poster. It wasn't really working.

The problem was that despite being the most illogical thing she'd ever heard, it was still the most logical explanation.

_Okay, Velma. _Think_. According to a stranger with a blue puppy—and remember, blue dogs aren't exactly normal outside of Congress—we're inside a movie poster. He didn't say why; you should probably ask that. _

"Hey, Joe."

"Yeah?" He looked startled to be addressed.

"Why did we... jump into a picture, anyway?"

"Blue's idea," he answered promptly. Then, more hesitantly, "I, uh, dragged you two along because leaving anyone in that snowstorm didn't seem like a great thing to do."

There was no arguing that point, so Velma nodded and returned to her thoughts.

_In any case, the fact that you're having this discussion with yourself means it's not an overly credible explanation, so if he's lying, it's not a very good lie. Then again, you've heard plenty of bad lies. So why would he be lying? Well... if it's a lie, then this is obviously a very elaborate scheme involving rapid involuntary transport and weather control. Which has managed to snare... you and Scooby... for no apparent reason. And other than being inexplicably thrown into a jungle, nobody's tried to do anything to you. So it's a highly complex scheme with no motive and no results. And that makes no sense._

During this internal monologue, she caught sight of something silvery in the distance, and adjusted course to walk towards it. The action was almost unconscious; if nothing else, Velma was used to exploring strange places. Joe seemed to be following her for lack of any better options. Actually, that was probably the same reason Scooby was following her. That and the only thing worse than being in a strange, creepy place with two other people was being in a strange, creepy place all alone.

She was glad for the company herself, but wasn't planning to admit it.

Approaching the silvery glint, she began to be able to make out shapes. "I think there's some kind of industrial complex up there," she said when a few shapes started to make sense. "Maybe we can find someone to help us."

Joe gave her a look that could best be described as doubtful. He was the expert on jumping into pictures, of course, but she opted to ignore that anyway. Much better to take action than to sit around worrying, and what was the worst that could happen?

..._You know better than to ask questions like that. Just keep walking_.

It took about five minutes to reach the outskirts of the complex, conveniently marked by a barbed-wire fence. That didn't seem encouraging, and Scooby gave a bit of a whimper. But the fence was also covered in rust and she noticed at least two fair-sized holes. "They're not much for maintenance around here."

"Rho's rhey?" Scooby inquired, sounding like he didn't want to know the answer.

"Hopefully we'll find out soon. Come on." She started following the battered fence to the left, where most of the buildings seemed to be clustered. She had some hope of finding a gate. More likely, they'd just find a breach in the fence big enough for them to fit through... inside the fence, the buildings were overgrown, and while the metal still had some shine to it there was plenty of cracking concrete visible even from their current distance.

Places that looked deserted frequently weren't. Velma knew this all too well. But her initial assessment of the complex was that it was, indeed, deserted; she'd change her mind later if need be.

A whole segment of the fence had fallen in on one corner, and she beckoned the others over. "Come on." Carefully picking her way over the mesh and barbed wire, she checked to make sure Scooby saw the barbs—of course, Scooby was pretty good at looking out for that sort of thing—then forged ahead into the complex.

It was a pretty ugly chunk of cement and stainless steel, no doubt. Someone had built this facility to be very secure. Not much for aesthetics, but secure. Around back there were several large liquid storage tanks, while the bulk of the complex seemed to be a garage and two long, low concrete buildings off to their left. Velma decided to start with the garage. That would be the easiest thing to get open, though she noted a small electronic box on the wall.

Scooby circled the area, sniffing at the weeds. "Rhink rhere's a ritchen?"

Of course there would be a kitchen; a place this big had to have something. Though she doubted it would be stocked. Or that the food would be any good if it was there—not that _that_ ever stopped Scooby. "No way to know that until we get inside; why don't you come help me get this door open?"

He took all of two seconds debating whether he really wanted to do that, but the possibility of food won out, as always. "Rokay!"

Joe wandered up too, studying the garage door as if he'd never seen such a device before. "Won't it be locked?"

"Mmhmm." She pointed to the box, and from this angle realized abruptly that a red light was flashing on it. _The place still has power? Or just a really efficient battery backup for the lock?_ "I'm counting on that part being broken."

He shrugged as if it were all the same to him, then took up a position on the other side of the door.

* * *

They gave it a couple of tries; when the door didn't budge, Velma concluded that the mechanism was, in fact, not broken, and started poking at the electronic lock. Joe watched her for a minute and wondered if she was really going to be able to get anywhere like that. And, for that matter, why they didn't just go find another door...

Since nobody seemed to be paying attention he headed around to look at the other buildings, or more accurately, the other doors. Every one of them seemed to have the same type of lock. _Okay, fair enough; should've expected that_. Though he noted that one of the doors seemed to be loose on its hinges. Worth looking into, but he wasn't about to do it by himself.

The whole complex was ugly, efficient, and utterly soulless; he didn't like it. Not that he was going to like much of anything until he found some sign of Blue... sighing, he realized he was even starting to see blue pawprints flickering at the edges of his vision.

_Wait_...

He looked again. It wasn't his imagination.

"Oh no."

Slowly, as if expecting something to come leaping out of the weeds and shadows at any moment, he edged toward the cluster of storage tanks. The area reeked of gasoline; no question about what was being stored there. Somewhat absently he noted that the tanks seemed to be in pretty good shape compared to the rest of the complex. _Yeah, well, you're usually more careful to secure the stuff that could explode all over you any second, right?_

The nearest tank had a blue pawprint slapped on the side. Instinct took over; Joe reached for his notebook. Instinct was promptly shot down by reality when he remembered that there was really no reason for him to have his notebook right now. It was at home, with Side Table, exactly where it belonged.

It wouldn't be entirely unlike Blue to be lurking behind a bush or something, giggling at his reactions. "This is a joke, right Blue?" he inquired of the emptiness, waiting for an answering bark assuring him that yes, this was a joke. It didn't come. Or at least, the bark he was _hoping_ for didn't come.

"Roe? Rhat's wrong?" Scooby came padding up to him looking confused; he sniffed deeply at the tanks and recoiled. "Ruck!"

"Yeah, yuck," Joe agreed. The fumes were starting to make him a little lightheaded, and he backed away. _Well. Looks like this isn't a joke, and the first clue is a gas tank. Weird clue, but okay._ _And... what exactly is the question?_

_...Oh yeah!_

He remembered now. They'd been running towards the scream... and he'd asked Blue what she'd seen. And she'd been half a second from leaping up and planting her pawprint in the air when it had started snowing and distracted everyone.

"Alright." He said it out loud just because it made it feel more normal; Scooby had already departed, probably equally dazed from the gasoline. "We're playing Blue's Clues to figure out what Blue saw."_ Or more accurately... what Blue saw right after the scream and right before the freak blizzard... but hey, details._

It felt a little odd to be playing Blue's Clues without his notebook. Or, for that matter, without at least one neighbor kid running around yelling for him at the first sign of a clue. But he was pretty sure he could handle it.

Pretty sure.

He'd handle it a lot better if Blue would actually show her face.

There was nothing more he could do here, so he headed back to where Velma was struggling with the door. "Any luck?"

"No." She sounded frustrated. "I... ugh. Scooby, what would Daphne do to get this open?"

"Rakeup."

"I was afraid of that."

Joe glanced from Velma to Scooby and back, wondering who Daphne was and what makeup had to do with anything, then shook it off. "There's a door in the far building that looks like it's about to fall down. Maybe we should just give that a try?"

"Sounds good to me." Velma took one more shot at the lock, probably just out of spite. A green light flickered, a mechanical click echoed over the complex, and the garage door started to rise up.

* * *

There were two vehicles in the garage which resembled oversized, roofless golf carts; the place could've held a dozen of them. If it were clean. It wasn't. Mechanical parts and debris (not to mention a healthy layer of dust) covered every other square inch of the floor, while all the wall space was taken up by equally cluttered and dusty shelves. Velma stopped by one of the carts and checked the ignition, then the frame. They seemed to be in fair shape. "I think these would probably still run, if they had fuel."

"There's gas tanks outside," Joe volunteered.

"Reah. Relly ras tanks," Scooby clarified.

Velma laughed. "Good to know. Um..." She was trying to find a good direction to take this. It wasn't really her area of expertise; she didn't usually run these debacles. That was all Fred. And what would Fred be doing right now? As if she really needed to ask. "We should probably split up."

That earned her the doubtful look she'd expected from Scooby, and a doubtful look she probably ought to have expected from Joe. "Ro we rave to?"

"We can cover more ground that way," she protested, more for the other human's benefit than anything, since Scooby had only heard this line of reasoning a few hundred times before. "Besides, why not? There's nobody here."

"_Ret_. Rhere's ralways a ronster rooner or rater," Scooby argued, sitting back on his haunches and crossing his arms. "Rot roing arone. Ro ray!"

For a moment Velma could do little but stare at Scooby in disbelief. He didn't tend to argue with Fred, let alone make perfectly logical arguments that didn't actually have a good answer... after all, he was right. There _was_ always a monster eventually. Then she realized why this was so strange. Usually it was Shaggy making the arguments, not Scooby—but Shaggy wasn't here either.

Maybe Scooby was feeling a little out of his depth. Just like she was. And she knew how to deal with that.

"How about if I give you a Scooby Snack?"

His eyes lit up. Jackpot. "Reah! Reah! Rooby Racks!"

It was a good thing Velma had learned, long ago, to never go anywhere without a few Scooby Snacks on hand. Anywhere. Not into a spooky haunted house, not into the nearest pizza parlor, not on one of her midnight pity excursions. _Anywhere_. So she pitched him a couple of the treats and watched him scarf them down.

"Rokay! Rhich ray?"

Velma giggled. She was about to suggest that he and Joe go together; the stranger had been looking more and more uneasy as things went on. But she realized when she started to say it that he'd already vanished. "Uh. Why don't you see if you can find anything in here?" She gestured expansively; there was plenty of ground to cover in the garage, and maybe a nice open space would be better than the spooky hallways which would, _undoubtedly_, be what they found in the building proper.

Scooby gave her a salute. "Rokay!"

Before making her way to the interior door, Velma caught sight of something on a nearby shelf that looked familiar, and promising. Flashlights. Probably a dozen of them. She grabbed one and tried turning it on. Nope, dead battery case. She tried the next one, and had exactly the same result. The fourth and sixth ones worked. "Scooby!" She tossed him one of the working flashlights. "Just in case you need it."

"Ranks, Relma." He grinned and offered another salute.

She felt a little bit better with the flashlight handy. Not only would it be helpful if the inside didn't have power, but when the inevitable monster showed up, she could bash it over the head.

* * *

He probably shouldn't have ducked out so quickly, Joe decided as he picked his way through the weeds. Velma had said split up, and Scooby had started arguing about it, and he'd realized abruptly that they were _used_ to this sort of thing. He had no idea why or how—he didn't much care at the moment, and hearing anything else was probably just going to worry him. More.

Removing himself from the situation before he learned any more about it had seemed like a good plan.

He was scouting the perimeter of the complex now, checking the fence for any more entry and exit points. Not because he really knew why he was looking, but because it sounded productive and got him out of the dusty, creepy building.

If he were perfectly honest—and being perfectly honest with himself really wasn't something he had to do very often—it wasn't the stark efficiency of the place that unnerved him. Not exactly. It was the fact that he was on the outside, and it turned out that a skidoo on the outside was _just_ as bad as being on the outside normally. This wasn't how a skidoo was supposed to work.

They were in a rain forest. Shouldn't there be a parrot or a monkey or something asking for help counting trees? Or looking for its friends? Or... anything, _anything_ but creepy overgrown industrial parks and broken fences. Let alone Scooby muttering about there always being monsters. There were no words for how little he felt up to dealing with monsters.

From the fact that she'd run off and still hadn't turned up, Blue seemed to be treating it like a typical skidoo. Which was probably all well and good from her perspective; he couldn't remember her ever drawing much distinction between the magical world and the outside world. But he would feel a whole lot better if he could keep an eye on her.

And if a monster showed up, he'd do what exactly? Run like a maniac no doubt, but at least he'd know where she was.

A snarl echoed through the trees and he froze. It wasn't as if the jungle had really been silent before—but this was _close_. "Okay. That's probably a bad sign." Voicing that fact to himself made him feel a little better. Not much, but a little. However, he was at least confident that Blue would have the sense to stay away from anything that was angry and snarling... hadn't Steve mentioned something about an allosaurus once?

Another snarl. Closer this time. He looked up sharply, staring out into the jungle, not sure what he was expecting, but expecting _something_. And _something_ showed up. Two glowing eyes stared back at him, and an enormous reptilian creature strode into view on the other side of the fence.

The thing had bulging eyes, splayed legs, and an impressive fin running down its leathery back. It was also baring more teeth than Joe personally felt were practical. Of course, his opinion on the matter was probably influenced by the fact that it seemed to be deciding if he'd make a good lunch.

Vague memories of conventional wisdom. _Wild animals can smell fear, or something, so don't act afraid. Fine_. He crossed his arms. "I don't suppose you're looking for a friend that's the same color as you, are you?"

It gave a faint snort.

"Didn't think so. I probably can't help you then; I'll be going." He turned away from it; he had no illusions that the fence was going to hold it back if it decided to charge, and wanted to at least be facing the right way. Sure enough, the beast snorted again and he heard the sound of rattling chain link from just behind him.

Joe bolted.


	3. Into the Breach

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 3: Into the Breach

* * *

Velma's original plan hadn't worked too well; Scooby had quickly determined that there was no food in the garage, and he had his priorities. So now _she_ was in the garage while he scouted the interior. He came back whimpering and asking how to open the locks, which she could only assume meant that he'd found the kitchen and it wasn't accessible. And while she found Shaggy and Scooby exasperating sometimes, the way they constantly searched for food rather than clues, right now she'd have been more than happy to tell the big dog the answer.

Except, of course, that she'd opened the door by slapping randomly at the lock, and had no idea what the combination was. "Um, I'm not actually sure. Try—"

An echoing snarl cut her off; Scooby whimpered and hid behind her. _Wonderful... there's our monster_. She supposed at least they were getting it over with. As soon as that jaded thought occurred to her, a second, much more worrisome point came to mind; she had no idea where Joe had gotten to, but for him to have disappeared without her seeing him leave, he must have gone back _out_side.

Surely he'd run away. Everyone always ran from monsters. Wasn't that always the point?

_Sure enough_. Another snarl, then what sounded like a weight slamming up against a fence, then Joe came skidding into the garage. "Um, guys? There's something large and angry chasing me, can we close the door?"

He sounded so desperately nonchalant about the whole thing that Velma couldn't help laughing. "I think we can..." She trailed off, blinking, as she realized it might be a little more difficult than she was letting on. There had to be a button around here somewhere that would close the door, but she hadn't really paid attention to where it might be.

Fortunately, Scooby tended to notice this sort of thing, and was halfway across the garage before she could even express any concern. "Rot it!" With a mechanical rumble, the door started to descend, though not before they caught sight of the beast that was charging after Joe.

Velma recognized it immediately, and her first question was what in the world one of _those_ would be doing here. _Maybe I should pay more attention to upcoming movies_.

The garage went dark when the door slammed shut; neither Scooby nor Velma had ever bothered trying to turn on the overhead light. They both still had their flashlights, at least. After a moment two beams of light cut through the sudden blackness, sweeping over the dust, and pretty much making it clear that the place was a lot creepier in the dark. As if they couldn't have predicted that already.

She heard Joe sigh. "Well that was something..."

CLANG.

"Gyah!"

"Rikes!"

Scooby and Joe both darted for the inside door at full speed. Velma turned around, noted the massive dent in the garage door, and followed without another thought.

* * *

Joe didn't breathe until the door was slammed shut and locked. Not that he entirely expected it to stop the thing behind them if it chose to follow, but... a little false security was better than no security at all right now, considering his heart was going at about a hundred beats a second.

That thing had way, way too many teeth. _Yeesh_.

If anyone had asked, Joe couldn't have said whether he was more worried about Blue or his own neck, but they were probably pretty close to even. He gulped some more oxygen and tried to calm down, tried to make himself think clearly about the situation.

"The first ten monsters are always the hardest," Velma commented, looking up at him sympathetically.

Well, _that_ took care of any coherent thoughts he'd been putting together. "You deal with monsters on a regular basis?" he demanded, sounding more panicked than he would've liked.

It didn't seem to bother her. "Actually yes."

They stared at each other for a minute. On one hand, Joe had plenty of things he'd like to have said about that revelation. On the other... well, she'd taken his comments about jumping into a picture at face value, he should really afford her the same courtesy. Besides, skepticism wasn't his strong suit. It wasn't even in his closet. He lived with a _talking table_.

"Fair enough." It explained why nothing so far had seemed to rattle her, anyway.

She moved out into the hallway and started sweeping her flashlight around. "Come on, we may as well look around; I doubt it can follow us in here."

"Yeah." Voicing it didn't make him move. He stayed planted squarely in front of the door, afraid that if he moved he'd lose his tenuous grip on rationality. Panicking would not help anything. "So you're the expert. What exactly do you _do_ when there's a dinosaur trying to eat you?"

"Wasn't a dinosaur," she answered simply.

_Oh. Well then_. "Pardon?"

"That wasn't a dinosaur, it was a dimetrodon. Dimetrodons were pelycosaurs; more like mammals than anything."

There was no doubt in Joe's mind that his expression must be vastly more dumbfounded than any look of confusion he'd ever put on for a neighbor kid's benefit. "Th... okay, that's fantastic, but—"

"Rot the rime, Relma!" Scooby's voice seemed oddly muffled.

"Yeah! What he said." Velma merely shrugged this off; he had the distinct impression she'd heard it before. "Okay, what do you do when there's a _dimetrodon_ trying to eat you?"

Shrug. "Well, first we figure out where Scooby's run off to." She gestured to the Great Dane's hindquarters sticking out from beneath a nearby desk. Joe arched an eyebrow; he'd have expected such a large dog to be a little braver. Especially if this sort of thing was routine. "Then Fred sets up a trap..."

Trailing off, her eyes sparked with something close to fear. Just for a moment. Then she seemed to physically shake it off.

"You okay?"

"Yeah, fine, sorry. Anyway, we set a trap and catch the monster, and then we take its mask off."

"Mask," he repeated.

Velma nodded seriously; Scooby whimpered. "99% of the time, the monsters are just some creepy person in a mask." He almost wanted to ask about the other 1%, but she kept talking, seeming to be thinking aloud. "Though if we're in a _movie_ poster... it's probably animatronic..."

Spoken like someone who knew nothing about skidoos, though he supposed that was only reasonable. But if she really believed that it could get dangerous; he could think of a few ways to disable a mechanical creature that would likely just make the dimetrodon mad. Or madder. "No. No it's not. It's _definitely_ real."

His vehemence seemed to startle her. "Ah." Doubt flickered clearly across her face for a moment, but then she shrugged again, and a thoughtful expression replaced the skepticism. "Odd that it's chasing us then; a fake one I could see, but I wouldn't think a real dimetrodon would recognize humans as prey. It must be starving."

Joe was about to snap at her for not making him feel _any_ better about Blue, but logic kicked in right before he could open his mouth. _Wait a minute. If the dimetrodon's starving then obviously it _hasn't_ gotten its fangs on Blue_.

This realization finally let him relax enough to move away from the door.

He still needed to find the puppy. And the closer to _immediately_, the better. But if she could shake the beast for this long, that was a good sign, and he would take any good signs he could get at the moment. Besides, there was always the possibility—slim but there—that she'd found some way into the complex, so... "So are we looking around here or what?"

"Yeah, we'd better. Here." She tossed him her flashlight and pointed right. "You go that way; I think Scooby wants me to help him with a lock."

"Reah! Reah!" Scooby jumped up so fast the desk went crashing down on its side. "Rhis ray!"

Joe watched them leave, chuckling slightly. Scooby was fun. Probably would be much more fun if they were meeting under circumstances that didn't involve mortal peril... then again, if they were meeting under any other circumstances, the meeting would be long over by now.

As he moved down the hallway, he noted a few supply cabinets, and decided to start checking them. He wasn't sure what Velma thought they were looking for, but _he_ was looking for clues. And Blue could leave those in the oddest places.

Like gas tanks.

Nothing in the cabinets had any clues, nor anything that looked useful for stopping a hungry dimetrodon. But he did find one full of office supplies, still in their plastic packaging... a grin spread across his face.

"Handy."

A minute later, he had a small red notebook and a pen, and a mostly credible drawing of the gas tank from outside. Suppressing a laugh, he stuck the notebook in his back pocket and went back to his search of the cabinets. He felt much better now.

* * *

Velma started questioning the wisdom of sending Joe off on his own pretty much as soon as they were out of earshot. After all, as he said, this was her area of expertise—not his. She wasn't sure what Joe thought they were looking for, but _she_ was looking for clues.

Scooby led her down a narrow walkway which, from her study of the outside of the buildings, she was pretty sure connected the garage to one of the other structures. "Right rere," he declared as soon as they turned the next corner, pointing to another electronic lock hanging beside a set of reinforced double doors.

Velma studied the lock, shrugged, and slapped it the same way she had with the garage door. A green light flickered on and the doors gave a hydraulic hiss. _Wow. Combinations are overrated_.

Immediately Scooby yanked the nearest door open and charged into what looked more like a food storage warehouse than a kitchen. "Ranks Relma!" echoed from inside the room, and she couldn't help a giggle.

He'd taken the flashlight, so for the first time she bothered to hunt down a light switch. A handful of dim, flickering bulbs came on when she flipped the switch, nowhere near the full compliment installed in the hallway, but more than enough to see by. _Odd that the place still has power when it's abandoned._ Abandoned _had_ to be the word. If something had happened to the people in this facility, she would expect to see bodies. At least a few. Bones, if nothing else.

_That's morbid. Stop it._

She decided to go after Joe. He hadn't gotten too far; it appeared he'd been going through every cabinet in the hallway. Maybe he didn't know what he was looking for, but he was certainly being thorough about trying to find it. "Hey Joe, find anything interesting?"

"I think so. Check this out." He held up some kind of pamphlet—it looked like he'd found a shelf full of them. "It's a map."

"A map?" Velma frowned and took the paper he offered. He was right; it was a brightly color-coded map of what she assumed to be an island, though maybe it was just the way the boundaries were drawn. She glanced through the images and found a heavily stylized picture of a complex with a garage, two long buildings, and some gas tanks outside. "We're here," she declared, pointing at it.

Joe had pulled out another copy. "Yeah, looks like."

The buildings were labeled with such utterly unhelpful names as _laboratory A_ and _logistics point __5D_. The complex they were in was listed as _supply depot 2_. She supposed its being a supply depot was believable enough; explained all the food. And why they had a shelf full of maps in the first place. More importantly though, in the center of the map was a large building labeled _main headquarters_.

That seemed almost too easy, but it was something. "I think if we want to learn anything more about this place, we're going to have to go there."

"Do we want to learn more about this place?" Joe inquired.

Velma blinked. It hadn't even occurred to her that this might be a question. "Of course we do, we..." Then she trailed off. _We're in a movie poster. If either of us had a clue what the movie was about, none of this would likely be a mystery. ...Then again, just because it isn't really a secret doesn't make it unimportant. _"I would think we need to learn everything we can, since we're stuck here." Then she hesitated. Maybe Joe was finally going to clue her in on what she was missing. "But what do _you_ think we should be doing? You're the expert on jumping into pictures."

"Not pictures like this," he mumbled almost to himself, folding up his map. Then, more conversationally, "I'm all for exploring. Maybe we'll find Blue. Besides..." He crossed his arms. "Who wants to be at a _supply post _when we could be right in the middle of this mess?"

Velma smirked; his sarcasm reminded her of Shaggy. But there had been just the slightest edge to his voice when he mentioned Blue. He was worried—and had every right to be, given the dimetrodon lurking about. So she nodded. "We'll definitely do everything we can to track her down. Let's get Scooby, get out of here, and see what clues we can find."

Maybe it was her imagination, but she thought Joe raised an eyebrow when she said _clues_.

* * *

The dimetrodon was gone. Velma had been all ready to run it down on the way out of the garage, too; Joe doubted that would've been the best way to deal with it, and was just as glad it hadn't been an issue. He was pretty sure a large angry dino—_pelycosaur_—would win in a fight against one of the glorified golf carts they were commandeering.

Against the one working cart, rather.

The garage door didn't raise all the way, thanks to the large dent the beast had left, but it opened far enough to permit the cart out onto the horribly overgrown slab of cement which sort of passed for a road. Past the fence it got even worse, more of a path than a road, but Velma was confident the little vehicle could manage the terrain.

"If you set up your huge mysterious facility in a jungle, you bring vehicles that can deal with the jungle."

He guessed that made sense.

With the dimetrodon not an issue, they took the time to make sure the gas tank was full. No sense getting stranded in the middle of a strange rain forest. ...Well, they were already stranded in a strange rain forest, but no sense getting even _more_ stranded. Then Velma took the wheel, Joe and Scooby piled into the back, and they were off. "Keep your eyes open, you two!" their driver instructed—looking back at them rather than the road as she did so. But there didn't seem to be any need to point that out.

Keeping his eyes open wouldn't be an issue, Joe decided. So far the jungle was decidedly lacking in blue puppies. Until that changed, his eyes would be entirely open.

Once he thought he caught sight of something light blue, twisted around to look, and the cart took an odd swerve at the same moment. With a yelp Joe made some attempt to right himself, but overcompensated and nearly fell out of the cart in the other direction. Would've, too, without the intervention of his fellow passenger: a large paw on his shoulder pulled him back.

"Rotcha!"

_Whew_. "Thanks, Scooby."

"Rou're relcome. Rold on right; Relma can't rive," he suggested.

"HEY!" came an indignant yell from the front. "That's only true about half the time!"

"Roh, right. Rorry!"

Joe chuckled, but was already back to straining to see... _ah_. The blue flicker appeared again. A butterfly. _Ugh_. This had the potential to get really old really fast; for an instant he found himself just a little bit annoyed with Blue. She wasn't stupid. Did she not realize that maybe this wasn't the best time to be playing games?

...But why would she? Given her experience, if she assumed a skidoo would always be safe, he couldn't really blame her. There was no sense being upset at Blue for being Blue.

It was just... it shouldn't be this way. She should not be in danger... and if she was he should be able to do something about it. In his whole life he'd never been good at anything but soccer and taking care of the kids, and he was in no mood to fail at the more important of those things. Certainly not here, not now, not like _this_.

"Hmm. That doesn't look too promising," Velma commented, a little too casually for Joe's tastes, and the cart rattled to a stop. There was a broken down cart by the side of the path. Not that it had been intentionally driven to the side. Or at least, he assumed not, due to the fact that the vehicle was upside-down and in several pieces.

The detached hood was sporting what looked suspiciously like a bite mark, but otherwise it looked like all the parts were there. _I guess golf carts aren't terribly nutritious. _He vaulted out of his seat and followed Velma over to the wrecked cart, then glanced back at Scooby. All he could see of the Great Dane was a squiggly tail sticking up from the seat. "You guarding the car, Scooby? That's brave of you."

A muffled "Raurding?" and in moments the dog was next to him. Which wasn't what Joe had been going for at all; he offered an apologetic look before turning his attention back to the wrecked cart.

Naturally, Velma was way ahead of him. "The gas tank isn't breached, but it's empty. This cart was probably abandoned on the path and something ripped it up later."

"Sure." Joe circled around, studying the wreckage carefully, though he was sure he couldn't add to her assessment. No sign that the vehicle had been anything other than abandoned—no blood or anything of that sort. Thankfully. One of the wheels had been torn off and was lying almost in the road, and when he finished his cycle around the cart's body, he took another glance at that detached wheel.

And the blue pawprint planted squarely on it.

"And that's clue number two," he muttered to himself, pulling out his notebook.

Velma came up behind him and poked her head over his shoulder to see. "Jinkies... looks like Blue followed this path too."

"Probably." It would be logical, he admitted to himself as he sketched the wheel. A road was a road, no matter how many plants were growing in it. "I guess we'd better keep going."

"I want to look at the rest of this a little closer..." Right about then she seemed to notice his drawing, and cocked her head. "What're you doing?"

"Drawing the clue," he answered. That earned him a very strange look. "It's a game we play," he explained, sounding just a little defensive even to himself. "She leaves pawprints on things, so they're clues." Not much of an explanation, but he was distracted. He didn't like being crowded when he was trying to think. Or any other time, really. And he truly _needed_ to think about this; these clues weren't the sort of obvious ones he was used to.

A wheel and a gas tank. Surely those two, taken together, were referring to some kind of vehicle, though that association struck him as odd. Then again, Blue couldn't know much more about this skidoo destination than he did. She would have no way of knowing when she left the first clue what she would find for the next clue, so maybe oddities were to be expected.

_A vehicle_. It was a start. He shrugged and put the notebook away.

Velma had been watching him the whole time. "So you're looking for clues..." She sounded thoughtful, but wandered back to the wrecked chassis without asking anything else.

* * *

The headquarters was just as stark and ugly as the supply depot had been; probably about four stories high and gleaming almost green in the jungle's filtered sunlight. The overgrowth was minimal—maybe that had to do with the fact that it was surrounded by a thick concrete wall rather than a fence—and the gate was heavily reinforced steel. Of course, the whole high security image was _slightly_ undermined by the access ladder built into the left door. The group wasted no time clambering over.

"That's kind of sending mixed signals," Joe observed as he dropped to the ground.

Velma shrugged. "Pretty certain this wall wasn't built to keep _humans_ out."

"...Ah."

What she also noticed, but didn't point out because Joe seemed edgy enough already, was that the complex was ringed with guard towers. No doubt when the place was still populated, there would have been snipers there making quite sure nobody unauthorized came over the wall. But now the towers were empty. Everything was empty.

Velma wondered, but did not ask, if Blue would know how to scale a ladder. Certainly Joe gave the impression that she was much more intelligent than the average puppy.

_Average puppy. You hang out with Scooby's family, what would you know about average puppies?_

The electronic locks were blinking red. "Think they have the same combination as the ones back at the depot?" she asked, not expecting or waiting for an answer. She gave the lock a good smack and it clicked open. "That's it. These things are obviously just so broken that the numbers don't matter."

"Robviously," Scooby giggled.

When they got into the building, their canine companion stuck his nose in the air, sniffed a few times, and made a beeline down one corridor. No great question about what was down _that_ way.

Velma turned her attention to Joe, who was looking around curiously. The further things went, the more she seemed to notice the gaps in his story. Sooner or later the questions would have to be asked. _This is as good a time as any_. "Okay, Joe. I need to know what's going on."

"Your guess is as good as mine."

She crossed her arms. "No, I don't think it is, and I think it's about time you told me the rest of the story."

Though he was about a foot taller than her, and athletically built, up until that moment Velma had not seen Joe as physically imposing. It was something about the way he carried himself. But even before she finished speaking, something truly intimidating blazed in his eyes. Fear and skepticism mingled with the tiniest hint of ferocity—like an animal. _A cornered animal. The most dangerous kind._

Oh yes... there was far more to him than he was letting on. And she wanted—_needed_—to know what she was missing.

The look faded after mere seconds, and he shrugged. "I don't know what you're talking about." So casually. He sounded like he meant it.

It occurred to her that she didn't actually know what to ask first. There were half a dozen points she'd really like to have clarified, but none seemed like a natural starting place. And she also just couldn't get around the fact that even when what he was telling her defied belief, he seemed utterly sincere.

And Blue. He was so worried about Blue...

She decided to just get everything over with at once. "You're hiding something that would make all of this," she gestured expansively, "make sense. Aren't you?" It wasn't really a question.

Mimicking her gesture he repeated, "This." It _was_ a question.

"All of this! You say you jump into pictures on a regular basis, but you don't seem to know how to deal with hostile natives, you're panicking over Blue at the same time you're saying she always runs off on her own..."

He glowered at her for a moment, then sighed. It wasn't really a patient sigh. "Then yes, if _that's_ what you're worried about, I'm hiding something that would make this all make sense." Velma's jaw dropped; she hadn't been expecting that to come so easily. But Joe was not conceding. "But what I'm hiding has absolutely nothing to do with the fact that we've got a lethal blizzard outside the picture, a hungry dinosa—_pelycosaur_—inside, and I'm missing a puppy. I say we stick to the real problems."

_Oh wow. _Through the whole response he hadn't so much as raised his voice, and by the end she was agreeing with him. And her mind did not generally work that way. _Who needs logical consistency when you've got charisma?_ She shook it off. But it took effort.

"I'm just supposed to take your word for that, then?"

"Yes."

There was something about him, something she couldn't explain, something that made it nearly impossible to drill him further. An odd warmth that had flickered only once, when she'd started demanding answers. She wanted to trust him. She couldn't trust her best friends—that was how she'd gotten into this mess, wasn't it?—yet she desperately wanted to trust this evasive near-stranger.

At the same time she had to have the answers. _Had_ to. The stakes were too high to let him just slip away from her questions like this.

"And if I don't?" What were his options? Technically, he could walk away. Then again, if everything he'd said this far was true, he almost certainly wouldn't. Thus far he'd been following her lead. If he didn't have a lead to follow... what then?

Silence cloaked the hallway for what felt like a very long minute. Then Joe closed his eyes. "Velma, if I had something to tell you that would help us, don't you think I would say it? Or have I somehow given the impression that I'm enjoying this?"

...Granted, she didn't think that at all. But still, he _was_ a suspect—

—_A suspect. Wait a minute._

Velma blinked as reality struck hard. That was what it came down to. She was treating him as a suspect. Yet if she still at least granted him that they were inside of a picture—and she _had_ to grant him that, because there was still the blizzard and the jungle to explain away—then there was no need for a suspect. Not in the usual sense. There was a mystery, no doubt, but if this whole setup wasn't some grand conspiracy, then there could hardly be anyone pulling the strings.

_I'm treating an issue of survival like it's just another guy in a mask_.

If the rest of the gang were here, someone would have noticed. Probably not Fred; he'd be busy trying to trap a dimetrodon. Daphne would have called her out for certain. Maybe even Shaggy, who could be pretty insightful when there was no food to distract him. But they weren't here and she'd merely focused on her own role.

Finding clues, and finding suspects.

Joe was watching her carefully; that trapped-animal look was back in his eyes. Velma was pretty sure the only thing stopping him from running was that he had nowhere to go. And if he did run she would be in a world of hurt; she didn't even know how to jump back out of the picture, whenever that became possible. That and... she really didn't want to chase him off.

If nothing else, he'd just proved _she_ couldn't do this alone either.

"Truce," she said quietly.


	4. Into the Abyss

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 4: Into the Abyss

* * *

Velma sat in the cafeteria, alone and feeling guilty. Admittedly she was getting used to those two states... she stared at the table and shook her head. Joe had slipped away, though he'd promised to be 'around', whatever that meant.

_Ugh_. She was disgusted with herself for handling this so badly, and genuinely bothered that she'd upset him. And worse, she couldn't figure out where to go from here. Blue was still missing—no sign of her except the pawprint back on the road. The dimetrodon was still lurking, and if they wanted any freedom of movement they probably needed to deal with that too. And Velma still had no idea how to jump _out_ of a picture.

Or what they might jump into when she figured it out. That blizzard...

How long had it been? Two hours? Three? Still the middle of the night. Plenty of time to get back without worrying the rest of the gang. If only she could find some answers, and a miraculous solution to a freak whiteout. And trap a dimetrodon.

Oh, hells, a trap. Fred's traps made even Velma's head hurt, but she'd have to give it a shot...

"Relma?"

She glanced up, startled; she'd been so lost in her own thoughts she'd missed Scooby's nails clicking on the tile behind her. "Hey, Scooby."

He sat at the table next to her and looked around. "Rhere's Roe?"

"Oh, I chased him off," she muttered bitterly. "Looking for suspects. You know how it is."

"Roh." Scooby watched her with large, concerned eyes. "Relma?"

"Hmm?"

"Are rou rokay?"

"No," she retorted flatly. He whimpered a little and her tone softened. "Sorry. I shouldn't take it out on you..." Reaching up and scratching his ears, she decided things were bad enough as it was, venting couldn't possibly hurt. "I've been trying to do my job... but there's no mystery here." She laughed without humor. "And everyone seems to think I'm the leader right now. But I haven't even been doing my own job right, how am I supposed to be Fred too?"

The big dog leaned over and licked her face. "Rhy be Red? Rou're Relma."

Velma blinked. "Ah... I... um."

That was a pretty good question.

All she'd really been thinking was that Fred was the leader, therefore the leader had to be Fred. A truly classic example of a logical fallacy. And of course it took Scooby—who probably thought a _fallacy_ was a type of pasta—to point it out. He was right.

"Do you think it's that easy?"

"Rhy rot?"

"Well... I haven't really done this before..." What was she saying? She was the designated smart one; surely she could learn to play a new role if she wanted to. Then again... maybe this was part of being Velma and not Fred. Fred gave orders. Velma asked questions. They both had their place, even with the same goal in mind. "But I think I can figure it out if I've got your vote of confidence. Are you with me?"

In response, he gave her a big, sloppy lick on the face. She'd take that as a yes.

* * *

Joe hadn't really gone anywhere, he'd just wanted to get away from Velma. Just for a few minutes to let himself cool down. He'd been about half a second from bolting on her, and that just wouldn't help his case at _all_.

So he was sitting just outside the cafeteria, leaning against the wall, staring blankly at the ceiling and still hoping—forever hoping—that Blue would come darting up any second. He would not give up. He couldn't give up. He was worried about her, and was beginning to realize he needed her desperately right now... needed someone, something to stop him from shutting down.

That _was_ his usual reaction to the outside, but he couldn't afford it now.

Within the magical world, it was easy to deal with problems. But every once in awhile, when he found himself at a momentary loss, dark thoughts started to spring up. Thoughts that maybe the responsibility was too much... that maybe he was silly to think he could handle it. Inevitably it led to a simple question. What would Steve do?

What would Steve do now? Probably not sit around moping, that was for sure. No, he knew what his brother would do. Steve would take charge, even if he had no idea what actually needed to be done. Maybe that would be better... maybe what he really needed to do right now was forget the dimetrodon, forget exploring, and just start scouring the jungle for any sign of blue fur.

Would that even work? It was a big jungle. And Blue had a habit of not being found unless she wanted to be.

Noise from inside. Words. Velma and Scooby were talking. Joe latched onto the sounds because otherwise the complex was silent; he didn't really _mean_ to eavesdrop, but there was nothing to be done for it.

He almost couldn't believe what he heard... it was too familiar. And there was no way it should be so familiar, because it was ridiculous. Velma, with all her questions and all her confidence, couldn't be having those same doubts... those same shadows... and yet...

Joe stood and stretched, moving to a nearby window and staring out at the jungle. Lost as he was without anyone from his world, it only made sense that Velma might be equally lost without the others from her world. Now that he thought about it... she _had_ mentioned others, from the very start... he distinctly remembered something to the effect of _what would Daphne do_.

Just a little bit familiar. And while he hadn't really blamed her for looking for answers before, it seemed even more reasonable now. What could it hurt? All that could really go wrong was... _well, she'll think I'm crazy. Never had _that_ happen on the outside before._

Not to mention, Velma wasn't exactly a typical person from the outside. She _had_ said the skidoo wasn't the strangest thing she'd done, and she _did_ hang out with a talking dog. And there was still her monsters... and that 1% of her monsters which weren't just guys in masks. Maybe this was different... maybe it wouldn't be so bad... maybe he was getting to really overuse the word maybe.

Maybe it was time to get it over with.

On the other hand, a little context wouldn't hurt.

"Hey Velma." He swung around the doorway and gave her his best no-hard-feelings grin. "If this isn't the strangest thing you've ever done... what was?"

Velma looked startled; he wondered if it was the question, or just the fact that he was speaking to her again. "Um... wow... ask me an easy one." _Okay, so probably both_. She exchanged glances with Scooby, who looked just as confused. "I... hmm. What do you think, Scoob?"

"Roonscar Risland?"

"Moonscar Island?" She cocked her head thoughtfully, then nodded. "Not a bad choice. Joe, you might want to come sit down." He complied and she leaned back, frowning, searching for words. "Easiest to start at the beginning. Scooby and I are part of a team of detectives..."

* * *

Cynical as it was, Velma had started out with reciprocation in mind. If Joe was going to ask her questions now, maybe she could convince him it was only fair to give some answers. Although... her intuition told her he was not asking out of idle curiosity.

Nonetheless, she told him the story. Scooby helped at first, with the slightly less scary parts. But about halfway through he decided the kitchen really couldn't do without his presence any longer, leaving Velma to finish the absurd tale herself. And it _was_ absurd. She'd forgotten how much so. Real zombies were bad enough—benevolent real zombies were worse—immortal cat creatures? Oy.

She was watching Joe carefully, practically daring him to challenge her, but he didn't. He wasn't even bothering to look skeptical.

"And that," she concluded, "is probably the strangest thing we've ever done. ...Probably. It's up there, at least."

He was giving her an odd look. Still not skeptical; just odd. "Huh. Didn't realize that sort of thing could happen on the outside."

_Outside? Outside of what?_

He didn't give her time to ask. "So... do you ever run into supernatural things that _aren't_ trying to kill you?"

"Rarely." She giggled at the memory. "Shaggy and Scooby did fall in love with a couple of aliens once..." But his words had seemed pointed and she shot him a searching look. "What are you getting at?"

"Well." Joe crossed his arms and leaned forward. "If I told you that Blue goes to preschool, I live with a singing table and an alarm clock who's learning to count, and there aren't a whole lot of _hostile natives_ in kids' storybooks... would that be enough to make this all make sense?"

Now _he_ was daring _her_ to challenge the story, and she almost did it by reflex: the same reflex that made her insist the monsters were never real, even when they were. But she forced that reflex back, because the more she thought about it, the less strange it sounded. And... well... yes. If she believed him, everything made quite a _lot_ more sense.

If.

But she did believe him. She had about a hundred new questions now, and that was just _great_, but she believed him. How could she not?

_So then... on the outside... hmm._

"Is this inside of a picture?" she asked seriously.

Joe probably couldn't have looked more shocked if the dimetrodon had come barging in. "No... I mean, kind of... it's complicated... but you... aren't you..." He shook it off, with obvious difficulty. "I'm not sure that's relevant right now."

"It probably isn't. I'm just curious."

Apparently that was exactly the wrong thing to say; the feral spark was back in Joe's eyes in an instant. And suddenly _that_ made perfect sense also.

"...Why do I feel like discussing this has gone badly for you in the past?"

"Because you're the designated smart one of Mystery Incorporated," he answered promptly.

_Shows he was listening. He gets an A for the day_.

For a few moments they just stared at each other. Then Velma offered, "Sounds like you lead an interesting life too." She was surprised at how much better that made her feel. Everywhere the gang went, they seemed to turn up monsters—but most people found that _strange_. Nothing about Joe's brand of supernatural companions seemed frightening, but... wasn't it about the same in the end? Phantom viruses, singing tables. Same story, different genre.

It was kind of refreshing, to know there was someone else out there who dealt with this sort of thing.

Before she could say anything more, a spectacular crashing erupted from the kitchen, and then Scooby's most pitiful howl of fear echoed through the cafeteria.

"Riiiiikes!"

"Uh oh..." Velma and Joe exchanged glances, then both nodded. And they ran.

They would have to continue this later.

* * *

The scene in the kitchen was pandemonium: empty cartons and overturned boxes littered the floor, though there was a certain lack of any actual food scattered about. Velma just looked at the mess and raised an eyebrow. "Thorough as always."

"This isn't a problem?"

"No, this is the usual result of Scooby meeting a kitchen, other than Scooby not being here. Come on." There was an open door off to one side. "Supply closet, I'd guess. He must've been looking for something and... aha."

Joe looked over her shoulder and saw that on the far end of the closet, the floor opened up into gaping darkness. Gaping darkness with hinges on the side. "That... seems like a silly place for a trapdoor."

"Pretty common in creepy abandoned buildings, believe it or not."

"Oh, I believe it." After the story she'd just told him, Joe was more inclined than ever to take Velma's word on most of this. "And now you're gonna tell me we're going down there, right?"

"Right."

"Fantastic." Joe distinctly remembered bringing his flashlight from the supply depot. Checking his pockets he concluded he must have left it in the cart. Even better. And Velma, apparently not worried about little things like visibility, was already unrolling a rope ladder that led down from the trapdoor. _This ought to be entertaining._

Well, he couldn't fault her for being worried about a dog.

The ladder swung. Badly. Probably largely because of the maddening swinging, it seemed to go on forever, though when Joe finally reached solid ground and looked at the square of light above he doubted they'd gone down more than two stories. He took a few moment to get his bearings and let his eyes adjust. Velma wasn't taking any such time.

"Scooby?" No response. She tried again, louder. "Scooby!"

"Relma!" The Great Dane's voice came from somewhere to the left, very faint and echoing slightly.

"Scooby! Are you okay?"

"Ruh-ruh..."

Velma's glasses glinted eerily in the dimness as she turned to Joe. "Come on, let's go!"

And they were running again. Joe immediately noticed that the ground was uneven; that seemed odd. _You'd think anyone who went to all the trouble of building this stuff would at least put some tile in their basement_. Pausing for a moment he knelt and ran a hand along the ground. Definitely dirt. Weird...

His hand hit something smooth and metallic, set into the dirt, but he couldn't identify it by touch and then Velma was calling for him to hurry up. When he looked up again he could just barely make out her shadowy figure, and it would not be a good idea to get lost when he couldn't see anything but blobs of dark and slightly less dark. He hurried up.

Soon enough, a dog-shaped blob of slightly more dark came into view, waving one paw as they approached. "Relma! Roe!"

"Scooby!" Velma ran up to him. The big dog didn't really look injured; he was sitting up pretty straight. And he was whimpering, but sounded more distressed than in pain. "What's wrong, Scooby?"

In response to Velma's question, Scooby reached back and held something up. It was crinkly and shiny and, if anything, looked like a bag of potato chips. An _empty_ bag, as he made clear by turning it upside down and shaking it. "Ri ran out of rhips," he announced plaintively.

Velma slapped a palm to her forehead. "Is that all?"

"Rall?" Scooby repeated indignantly. Then, "Roh, rand there's racks."

It was Joe's turn to field the comment, though he was more confused than exasperated. "Didn't you just say you're out of snacks?"

"Rot racks," the dog protested, "racks!"

"Tracks?" He remembered the metal in the ground and his eyes widened. "Oh, yeah, those tracks..."

Velma shifted, turning to him. As if looking at each other really meant much; all he could make out of her now was a silhouette with shining glasses. Which was just as creepy now as it had been earlier. "What tracks?"

"There's some kind of rail running down this tunnel. Maybe train tracks."

"Reah, reah. Rain racks!"

There was a pause while Velma backed up, feeling around on the ground until she apparently found what she was looking for. "Huh... interesting. You're right—there's two rails—they must lead somewhere. Any objections to following them?"

_Heh. She's funny_._ I'm sure we have better ideas. _"Nope."

"Ruh-uh."

As they began following the tracks, Joe couldn't help being amused. Before that moment he'd have said this night had gone purely and painfully _off_ the rails.

* * *

It was a really, really long tunnel, and Velma started to regret the trip about fifteen minutes in. Surely if there were train tracks there had to be a train, or would that make too much sense? Too late now.

For the most part they were silent, which didn't help make the dark and creepy tunnel any less creepy. She wanted to ask Joe one of the dozens of new questions their last talk had raised, but discretion really _was_ the better part of valor. This wasn't the time or the place. Every so often he started whistling something, then seemed to quickly think better of it. She wished he'd just keep it up, but maybe the silence was a good thing. They'd hear anything hostile coming.

Like, say, a dimetrodon. Could dimetrodons see in the dark? Who knew? Not that it should have any way to get down here, but...

It seemed to be getting even darker up ahead, which was something, considering it was almost pitch black already. At the same time the ground started to slope noticeably upwards. "I think we might be getting near the end."

"Ro boy! Rhe rend!" Scooby barked out excitedly, and started sprinting ahead, a swiftly moving patch of darker... darker... _uh oh_.

Velma realized _exactly_ why it was getting darker ahead of them. "Scooby, wait, don't—"

_Thud_. "Rowch!"

"Too late," Joe muttered; it didn't take any light to see his wince. Then he moved forward cautiously, reaching up after a few seconds. "Yep... we've got a ceiling here."

"Excellent. Can either of you find a handle or a latch or something? There must be one." She was tempted to move up herself, but with the tunnel closing off, there was a fair potential she'd just be just getting in the way.

"Think I've got something... it's just a litt—oh wow." Joe's comment was punctuated by a faint tremor running through the walls. With a mechanical groan and the sound of rusty hinges squealing in protest, the ceiling began to rise up, momentarily blinding the group as light from the outside spilled into the tunnel.

Velma recovered first, blinking back afterimages as she moved up and looking around at where they'd come out. She was staring at a battered fence... a fence surrounding a small complex with an open garage, two long concrete buildings, and several gas tanks to one side.

Joe trotted up beside her and shook his head. "You're kidding."

"Rou've _rot_ to re ridding," Scooby agreed.

Privately agreeing with those comments, Velma pulled the map out. The roads and buildings were clearly marked, but... looking closer she saw a series of other paths, seeming to branch out from the main headquarters to all the supply depots. These paths were marked in a pale gray—no big surprise that she'd missed them the first time. And there were distinct tracks. "Of course... those little carts above ground wouldn't be able to carry much. The tunnels must be how they move—or moved, I guess—supplies around."

There certainly were a lot of tunnels... an idea was starting to form. But Joe and Scooby were already on the move, heading to the dubious safety of the buildings, and her idea was going to take quite a bit of work to pull off anyway, so she followed.

Back inside the garage, Joe sat on a dusty crate and looked around. "I don't even know what to say."

"Ro, rother," Scooby offered, sitting back.

"...Has a nice ring to it. Yeah. Oh, brother."

While her companions were commiserating, Velma was investigating the broken-down cart they'd left behind earlier. What she needed to do should not be overly difficult—dangerous, perhaps, but not difficult. It amused her because she'd never foreseen herself making any practical use of bomb-making knowledge before...

Glancing up to tell the others something they weren't going to like, she caught sight of something very out of place, and vaguely familiar. A pawprint, a bright blue one, was planted haphazardly on a cross-shaped bit of scrap metal. Well at least that was something.

"Hey Joe? There's a, uh, a clue. Behind you."

He gave her a look that could best be described as unamused; it faded quickly. "Yeah," he sighed, "that's where they always are..." He pulled out his notebook, turned around, and recoiled slightly. "Now what is _that_ supposed to...?"

"A ross?" Scooby volunteered.

"Well I got that it's a cross, it's just..." Whatever he was getting at, Joe gave up on it, and silently sketched the cross in on a blank page. "Okay, so..."

"Bowbowbow!" Something blue and furry came hurtling down from on top of the garage door, landed on Joe's lap, barked, and hopped to the floor. "Bow bow bow!"

"Blue?"

"Rue!"

Velma and Scooby exchanged glances; they'd both yelled the puppy's name, but their companion quite notably _hadn't_. He was staring at Blue as if she were some kind of apparition—as if he didn't believe she were there to begin with and if he dared to look away, she'd be gone.

Blue's rapidly wagging tail slowed, just a little, as her human failed to say anything. "Bow bow bowbow, Bow?"

"...Am I okay?" he repeated blankly. "I... wait a minute... are _you_ okay?"

"Bow bow," she agreed, nodding. "Bow bow bowbowbow."

"Exploring," he mumbled, sliding off the crate and leaning over to look at her more carefully. "But you're... you're not hurt or anything? You're sure you're okay?"

"Bow bow."

Shuddering a little, he pulled back and took a few long, slow breaths. "Blue, I need you to do me a favor. If we ever skidoo on the outside again—_especially_ if we don't know what we're skidooing into—can you not run off like that? Please?"

Ever the investigator, Velma latched onto the unfamiliar word. _Skidoo? ...Jumping into pictures maybe? This is a bad time to ask_. _Later._

After a few moments Blue gave a thoughtful set of barks. "Bow... bowbow." Another hesitation. "Bow? Bow bow bow?"

Joe laughed. Not without humor, yet it was almost a painful sound. Then he dropped to his knees and hugged her. "I _was_ scared."

"Bow..." Her ears drooped. "Bow bowbow Bow." After hearing her a bit more Velma was sure she could make out what Blue was saying—and she was sure there had been an _I'm sorry_ in that mournful series of barks.

Joe didn't say anything, he just buried his face in the blue puppy's fur, and she twisted around and licked him a few times before he pulled back. And when he looked up again he was... different. For all the emotion he'd just displayed there was a new confidence blazing in his eyes. As if Blue's return had returned some part of him as well.

Whoever he was, whatever he was... he was certainly _different_.

It wasn't a bad thing.


	5. Into the Open

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 5: Into the Open

* * *

"Bow bow bow bow bow," Blue pointed out as the silence began to get awkward. _You have all three clues. _

Aha. Yes. She was right about that. Joe returned his attention to the notebook, then remembered what the third clue had been and grimaced. This was going to be... something. "Okay, so let's have a look." He flopped back onto the crate he'd been sitting on earlier, mentally tagging it the Thinking Box, and examined his drawings. The clues had not improved.

A gas tank, a wheel, and a cross. And try as he might...

_Yeesh. This is awful._

He was pretty sure the gas tank and the wheel still meant a vehicle. Cars were not a topic he was all that good with—though he was pretty sure he knew at least as much about model names as Blue possibly could. All that was coming to mind was the Popemobile.

Not likely.

He was about to start talking to himself when Velma broke in. "Joe, is something wrong?"

"I don't know. I'm thinking." That earned him a very strange look, so he clarified, "Trying to figure out the clues... but they don't make any sense."

Velma raised an eyebrow, then grinned. "I'm pretty good with clues. Run this game by me."

Oh. Right. It would help if he'd told her anything about Blue's Clues other than that pawprints were clues. Resisting the urge to give her the whole song routine—he was not going to press his luck—he held up the notebook. "It's not just chasing pawprints around. The clues _mean_ something. We've got a gas tank, a wheel, and a cross..."

"Popemobile."

Oddly enough, that made him feel a lot better. "I already ruled that one out."

"Hmm..." A thoughtful frown crossed her face. "There's a city in Canada called Carcross..." Now it was his turn to give her a blank look. "Probably not it?"

"Probably not it." Joe shook his head and looked at Blue. He was sure she knew _what_ Canada was, if not exactly where, and she'd probably never heard of a Popemobile. "Hey Blue? How about another clue or two?"

"Bowww..." She shook her head. "Bow bowbowbow bow bow bow bowww bow bow. Bowbow." Her response startled him; he'd expected to be admonished for trying to cheat. Instead, Blue seemed almost apologetic—but she'd told them all she could.

Snarling from the outside. Distant, yes, but if it was close enough to hear it was close enough to be worrisome. Velma, who had been pondering the combination of vehicles and crosses along with the rest of them, suddenly became all business. "Joe, Blue, no offense, but I think we'd better worry about games later... there's still an angry dimetrodon about."

"But—" Joe bit his protest off. Clues didn't usually wait, but they weren't usually in a skidoo with something trying to eat them, either. What were they playing to figure out again, anyway? ..._Right. What she saw right before the snow started_... He frowned. It seemed like that _might_ actually be pertinent when they got out of here, but it could at least wait until then. "Yeah, you're right. You have a plan?"

"Hmph." Velma crossed her arms. "Hardly worthy of the name. _Fred_ makes plans. Fred also makes traps. Fred's traps have finesse. This trap... isn't going to."

Scooby gave a snort of laughter. "Red's raps ron't work, reither. Raybe rours rill?"

"Here's hoping." She pointed to the broken cart. "I can take the fuel tank and some other parts of that cart, and make a pretty crude explosive charge. Should be more than enough to blast through into one of those supply tunnels. Then all we have to do is lure the dimetrodon over the pit. It'll be stuck there at least for awhile—they certainly weren't known for their climbing ability."

She'd lost him around the word _explosive_. "Is, uh... is blowing things up... really necessary?"

"Unless you have a better idea."

Truthfully, better ideas than blowing things up seemed like they ought to be easy to come by, but then he remembered they were dealing with something twelve feet long that had lots and lots of teeth. The only thing he could think of was to just _leave_, skidoo back out. But if it was still snowing that would probably end up much worse. "Hm. Blue, we need a better idea."

"Bow bowbow bowbow bow bow?"

"Trapping a dimetrodon."

"Bow bow bowbowbowbow?"

...Good point. "It's a pelycosaur."

"Bow. ...Bow bow bowbowbowbow?"

"Not a clue." He looked back at Velma and shrugged. "Okay, so we don't have any better ideas."

She giggled, produced a screwdriver, and set to work on the cart.

Joe drew his knees to his chest and considered the situation. He kept glancing at Blue, almost involuntarily. And she kept not disappearing. Eventually she noticed him looking at her and jumped up on the box beside him, nuzzling up against his arm.

"Bow Bowbow bowbow?"

"She's building something." He cocked his head. Explosions would tend to lead to fire. Had fire safety ever come up around here? Certainly not since he'd moved in. "Blue, d'you know what to do around fire?"

She thought about this for a moment, then nodded. "Bow bow." _Don't touch_.

That would do.

* * *

They were picking their way through the forest, slowly so as not to lose their bearings. The tunnel didn't run directly beneath the road, but the map indicated it ran straight from the depot to the main building. That made it easier. But the map had better be right, or this whole thing would get a lot more complicated.

The other reason for the speed was the minor detail that Velma was carrying an improvised explosive device. It was perfectly safe if handled correctly, as she kept assuring the others, but only Blue seemed to believe her.

"So how do we know we're not gonna burn the whole forest down?" Joe asked, making a not terribly convincing attempt to sound nonchalant. He'd been co-opted into hauling a heavy coil of rope along, and by the looks of it he was half expecting _that_ to explode any moment also.

_Not many pyrotechnics in kids' storybooks either, I guess._

"The vegetation's not dry enough for a fire to get much of anywhere. Also, that's what we have the shovels for." She nodded to Scooby, who was carrying three large shovels from the depot.

"Bow bow bow bowbow bow bow Bowbow," Blue broke in, sounding concerned.

That was far too much for Velma to try to translate, so she looked at the other human, who was stifling a giggle. "No, you're right, they _don't_ look very much like Shovel. But that might be what he'll look like when he grows up." Falling in closer to Velma as he noticed her questioning look, he explained softly, "Shovel's one of our friends. You know those little plastic sandbox toys? One of those."

"When he _grows up_?" she repeated.

"He's basically in preschool too. Most of them are..." Perhaps noticing her expression, he smirked. "And yeah, they're all along those lines. Shovel has a sister named Pail; I'll let you draw your own conclusions."

"Jinkies." A mantra of _zombies, aliens, and viruses_ kept ringing through her head, preventing her from saying anything else that she might regret. It wasn't about believing him. It was just about the story being _weird_... even by Velma's standards. It took a little effort to grasp it all.

His expression became a little less snarky, as if he were reading her thoughts. "You get used to it."

"I don't doubt that at all. ...How long did it take you?"

"Not applicable."

For someone who didn't care much for questions, he sure did raise a lot of them. But there wasn't time to deal with it. She could see the trees thinning out a bit up ahead; it was time to put her plan into action. "Okay guys, let's dig it!" She gently placed the modified gas tank well out of the way, then grabbed a shovel.

Joe and Scooby each obediently pitched in, and Blue gave an indignant bark. "Bow bow bow bow!"

"Rou rant to relp?" Scooby translated uncertainly.

"Bow!"

"Yeah, but there's only three—"

Scooby cut off Joe's confused protest. "Ro problem!" Grinning widely, the big dog offered the puppy his shovel, then extended his claws and sprang at the small indentation they'd made so far in the ground. A few moments later dirt was flying everywhere.

Blue, after wrestling a bit with the shovel—which was, after all, far too big for her—got the tip planted and began jumping up and down on the top of the blade. After a few good jumps, she backed off, took a flying leap to push over the handle, and successfully turned up a small clod of dirt. "Bow bow bow!"

Joe giggled and patted her head. "You did, that was great!" Then he turned his attention to the other dog, who was digging much more efficiently. "Um, Scooby? I don't think we're supposed to be breaking through to the tunnel quite yet..." He glanced at Velma for confirmation.

She'd been about to say something like that anyway. "He's right Scoob, I think that's good."

"Ruh? Roh. Rokay." A furry brown head popped up out of what had to be a seven foot deep pit.

"Rope please." Joe gladly handed the rope off, and Velma began setting up her bomb. This was the iffy part... she tied the rope off and handed the tank to Scooby. "Okay Scoob... set this down very gently, with the end with the rope at the top. Then come on out."

He didn't seem at all reluctant about getting out of a hole with a bomb in it. Admittedly, even knowing it was safe, she couldn't blame him for that. She uncoiled a good length of the rope, cut it with a pocketknife she'd scavenged from the depot, and then pulled out a book of matches. "Now we should move."

Nobody argued, and about fifty feet away, she lit the fuse.

The noise was likely to draw the dimetrodon's attention no matter what; Velma had high hopes that the big ugly thing would just waltz into the ensuing hole on its own. Hopes... but she couldn't count on it. She had a backup plan, of course. A backup plan with four legs and a big appetite. Didn't they always?

They weren't hanging around at fifty feet waiting for the bomb to go off. As soon as she lit the fuse they were running again. Better safe than sorry.

* * *

The explosion wasn't as loud as Joe had expected. Plenty loud enough. But not as loud as he'd expected. He felt it as much as he heard it, really—the ground quaked for a moment, and a wave of intense heat radiated out over them, taking his breath away. He coughed and stumbled; Blue yelped and jumped into his arms. "Bow bow bowbow!"

"It's okay," he assured her after a gasping breath or two. Didn't sound too convincing to himself, but it was apparently enough for Blue. She calmed a little, snuggling up against him.

"Bowbow."

Velma signaled for quiet, and a faint snarling echoed over the jungle. "That got its attention," she whispered.

"Fantastic."

They remained still and silent, waiting, barely daring to breathe, and the noise began to come closer. But, if Joe was judging his distances correctly, not near close enough. Plus there was the notable absence of the very _angry_ snarling which would undoubtedly be the result of ol' large, fanged, and toothy falling into a pit.

_What's the difference between normal snarling and angry snarling, anyway? ...One's angrier. Or something_.

Finally, the air began to cool and Velma whispered again. "Let's go see."

Much more cautious than they'd been while running away, the group made their way back to where the bomb had gone off, Velma kicking out a couple of smoldering patches of grass as they went. She'd assured him the blast would be largely contained, both by the pit and by the fact that she'd shaped the charge. Whatever that meant... he'd been pretty sure the 'charge' was just a tank of gasoline with a rope tied into it, but clearly he had missed something.

In any case, it had worked. Scooby's original handiwork had become a gaping hole probably twenty feet in diameter, opening cleanly into the tunnel below; a bit of the day's fading sunlight could be seen glinting off the tracks. "Not bad," Joe complimented.

If he wasn't much mistaken, she blushed. Slightly. "Thanks."

"Row rhat?" Scooby asked, sniffing around the perimeter. He didn't sound particularly questioning, as if he already knew what was coming.

"Well, first we cover the pit—can I have that rope back, Joe?—and then we lure the dimetrodon over it. It's too heavy for the rope to hold, so it should fall right in, and we'll be all clear until we can leave."

It sounded like a good plan to Joe, but Scooby sat back on his haunches and glowered. "Ruh-uh. Ri know rhat rhat reans. Ro way!" He crossed his arms. "Ri'm _rot_ ronna be rait rithout Raggy!"

_Bait? _

Velma seemed unconcerned; it looked like she'd probably had this discussion before. "Would you do it for a Scooby Snack?"

Immediately Scooby's whole demeanor changed; his eyes lit up and he jumped back to all fours. "Reah! Reah! Rooby Racks!"

Velma giggled and produced a small bag of what looked like small, dark brown cookies. Presumably Scooby Snacks. "Okay, go long!"

Immediately Scooby bolted off, and Velma wound up and threw one of the snacks in his general direction. The Great Dane vaulted into the air, twisted around, and caught the snack in his mouth in a wonderful display of canine acrobatics, then landed and gulped it down. "Scooby-dooby-doooooo!"

Turning away and grinning, Velma hesitated before putting the bag away. "Blue, do you want to try a Scooby Snack too?"

Blue's ears perked up. "Bowbow Bow? Bow... bow!" She sounded enthusiastic at the prospect. When Velma tried to hand one to her, the puppy shook her head and made a throwing motion. "Bow bow! Bow bow!" _Go long!_

_I am so _not ever_ telling Steve where she picked up that expression_.

Shooting Scooby a withering look—it looked like there was a _don't you dare steal this _somewhere in there—Velma nodded and gave the snack a good toss. Not as far as she'd thrown Scooby's, obviously. With a cheerful bark Blue shot after it, leaping up, missing the snack with her mouth and plucking it out of midair with one ear instead. Blushing slightly she landed, took a cautious nibble, then swallowed the rest of the snack in two bites.

"Bowbow-bowbow-bowwwwwwww!"

Joe couldn't help bursting into laughter. "That... was awesome."

"Want one?" Velma asked, holding up the bag. "Shaggy eats them all the time."

..._Um_. There weren't a whole lot of crazy things that Joe wouldn't try, but eating dog treats seemed to be asking a little much right now. "No thanks. I couldn't run it down very well anyway." _Maybe some other time_ came to mind, but of course that was silly. Once they got out of this he couldn't foresee running into these two again.

To his surprise, that thought saddened him a bit.

* * *

This trap was too simple. What it really needed to be worthy of the name _trap_ was a sheet, two pulleys, three magnets, some kind of ill-defined signal that would go off slightly too late, and perhaps a bucket of ketchup. Velma honestly didn't know how Fred did it.

What was oddest about this trap was the bait. Dimetrodons were predators, but as she'd mentioned when they'd first encountered the beast, this one should have no reason to recognize humans—or dogs—as prey. So Scooby was sitting out in the middle of the rain forest with a large steak.

Well, he'd been sent out with two large steaks. One was for the dimetrodon. The other one was undoubtedly gone already.

Joe was crouching next to her, staring intently on the pit, and Blue was clinging to his back. The setup looked oddly natural.

"Bow bow bowbowbowbow bow bow?" Blue barked very softly.

Something about_ look like?_ Her understanding of Blue's barks was far from complete. Joe went ahead and answered while Velma was trying to translate. "It's really big, kinda greenish, and has a fin on its back. And it has a lot of teeth."

"Bow. Bow bow?" She pointed off to the right.

Joe stiffened; Velma followed the puppy's gaze and swallowed hard. "Uh... oh that's not good."

Sure enough, two faintly glowing eyes were visible through the trees. And attached to the eyes were a small head, a large fin, and splayed legs that waddled through the undergrowth with surprising speed.

"So um... Velma?" Joe was trying not to sound worried again. He still wasn't any good at it. "This isn't part of the plan, right?"

"Right."

"So what do we do now?"

"We run."

"Aha." He nodded seriously. "Okay." Then, glancing over his shoulder, "You heard her Blue... run!"

They ran.

"Watch for the pit!" Velma warned as they broke through the clearing. It wasn't hard to see, in all honesty—the cover was just a mesh of rope and leaves. It didn't exactly blend in with all the dirt and grass around it. Joe and Blue veered right, she dodged left. The dimetrodon had broken into a loping run as well, and chose to pursue Velma. Closely. Close enough that it, too, went off to the left, well around the pit it was supposed to fall into.

"Oh jinkies," she mumbled, and started to run faster.

"Relma? Roe? Rue?" Scooby's head shot up as the three darted past him. "Ron't tell re..."

"Okay, we won't tell you. Just start running! Oh, and you can have the other steak."

Whatever he might think of running from angry pelycosaurs, Scooby wasn't going to argue with eating the other steak. He'd just finished inhaling it when the dimetrodon charged up. "...Rikes! Rait for re!"

This was never going to work. They had to get the dimetrodon back to the pit somehow. "Guys, we need to get back to the pit!"

"There's something large and angry right behind us," Joe pointed out.

Fair point. Velma was about to suggest they circle around and simply hope they could get back to the clearing, when suddenly Blue gave an excited series of barks. "Bow bow bow bowbow!"

_She's got an idea? _

Blue turned around, and Joe skidded to a halt, "Blue, what are you—"

"Bow bow bow!" _Hide and seek! _The puppy darted straight at the dimetrodon, jumped up on its head, and planted her front paws squarely on its face; when she jumped off again there was a bright blue pawprint covering each of its eyes. "Bow bow!" _You're it!_

_You're kidding._

_"Blue!" _Joe's tone was an even mix of reproachful, terrified, and admiring.

"Bow?" _What?_

Rather than actually trying to respond to that he ran in and snatched her up off the ground, backing well out of the blinded, writhing beast's reach. He looked very much as if he'd forgotten all about returning to the pit until Scooby, running ahead of Velma now, grabbed his shoulder and spun him around.

"Ret's ro, Roe!"

The pit was still there, waiting for its victim, and they regrouped on the other side and waited. Velma found herself muttering under her breath. "Come on, you big ugly proto-mammal. Come and get us."

"Roto-rammal?" Scooby repeated, sounding every bit as exasperated with her as she often felt with him. Then his eyes widened, slightly. Following his gaze she noticed one of the discarded shovels lying at the base of a tree. "...Ri've rot rhis!" He seized the shovel and went racing back into the forest, following the sound of the dimetrodon's snarls.

There was a wicked _clang_, and the snarling reached a new volume. A moment later Scooby was on his way back, legs flailing at full speed. "Rook out!"

Velma saw where this was going. It had only happened a hundred times before. "Scooby, the trap!"

"Scooby-dooby-dooooo!" The big dog launched himself with all his might, sailing over the great hole in the ground and landing squarely in Velma's arms.

"Oof!" Her knees buckled, but somehow she stayed upright under the impact.

"Bowbow!"

"Nice catch," Joe giggled. Easy for him to say—the dog _he_ was holding was a lot lighter.

Their monster had been following Scooby closely, but dimetrodons weren't known for their jumping ability any more than their climbing. It moved right over the pit. And with a dozen sharp snaps, the ropes gave way, dropping the beast out of sight.

Just before Velma's arms gave way, Scooby hopped to the ground on his own, and dusted her off a little. "Ranks, Relma." He crept forward and looked down into the uncovered pit. A roar echoed up from below and he recoiled. "Rikes! ...Ran re ro somerere relse?'

There was no reason to run away from a hole that happened to have a dimetrodon in it. Nothing was going to happen... another snarl and Velma decided that sometimes, logic really was overrated. "I'm all for that."

* * *

By the time they got back to the depot, Blue was wriggling a little in Joe's arms. He was reluctant to let her go, though that seemed irrational. The dimetrodon was well and truly incapacitated, but... even so...

"Bow bow? Bow bow bow."

"Yeah, okay." He let her hop out of his arms and she shook herself off, seeming happy to be moving on her own again. Of course she _didn't_ seem too inclined to move more than about a foot away from where he was standing. "Blue, you okay?"

"Bow, bow bow bow! ...Bowbow. Bow bow." _Yeah, that was fun! ...Scary. But fun_.

She had _no_ idea.

"We ought to be safe here for the duration, now." Velma took off her glasses and cleaned them off, squinting at him with pale blue eyes. "So when you're inside a picture... is it real time? I mean, if we've been in here for four hours, has it been four hours outside too?"

That was something Joe had never really thought of. For one thing, they rarely stayed long enough for it to matter. But, at least in the magical world where skidoos were _supposed_ to happen, it was possible to interact with the characters on the other side before jumping; they never seemed slowed down or sped up. "I'm pretty sure it is, yeah."

"That's a plus." She replaced her glasses and shook her head. "But we don't have any way of knowing if the blizzard's over with yet..."

"We may," he volunteered. "The picture back out might show us."

"Picture... back out?" A hesitation. "You know, I've kept _meaning_ to ask how we get out of here, and there just never seemed to be time."

"Can't imagine what would've been more important," he smirked, glancing in the general direction of the dimetrodon's pit. "But it's easy, we just have to go back to where we came in. There's always a picture that leads back to the outside." This had always seemed very logical to him, but he supposed he couldn't blame Velma for not guessing. After all, talking soap seemed perfectly logical to him also.

And _he_ would never think, when confronted by a monster, that the obvious solution was to trap it and take its mask off. So they were even.

"Re rame in rhat way," Scooby declared, turning and pointing a ways behind them. "Rhere's the roken rence."

"Yeah, he's right," Velma agreed.

"Yeah, probably."

"Bow bowbow."

They moved, not quickly, but with purpose. Everyone was ready to leave, Joe assumed... it had been late even when they'd first met up, and now it was really, really late. He wasn't sleepy—the adrenaline was taking care of that—but that couldn't last much longer. Before long they were _all_ going to crash. Briefly he wondered if they should've just checked the map for a residential area. Surely there must be one, with all this other stuff... and surely by tomorrow the blizzard would be over.

Be a hell of a thing to explain to Mr. Salt and Mrs. Pepper, though.

Besides, even _without_ a dino—pelycosaur trying to eat them, he didn't like it here. Best to get out as soon as possible.

The surroundings were starting to look vaguely familiar. Jungle was jungle, but he was sure they were going the right way, though he didn't recall everything being quite so pale.

..._Wait a minute_...

Something was wrong. It wasn't just that twilight was falling over the rain forest, making everything look a little off. No... the colors were more wrong than that. And the temperature was falling too quickly, especially as they approached where they'd come in.

Joe saw it, but wasn't willing to believe it. Not until they broke through the trees, back into the clearing where they'd entered, and were confronted with a whirling mass of whiteness.

It was snowing.


	6. Into the Cold

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 6: Into the Cold

* * *

Whatever Velma had expected to find, snow _in the jungle _was at the bottom of the list. She looked at Joe, opening her mouth to ask if this was something unusual. One look at his expression made the question pointless. He stood dead still, staring at the snow with unmitigated terror in his eyes. As if it realized they were there, the wind began howling and the blizzard intensified.

As if it_ realized they were there_. How patently ridiculous... Velma knew how to deal with things that were patently ridiculous. Run away. Preferably as fast as possible.

"Back to the depot, come on!"

"Ray aread of rou!" Scooby yelped, nearly spinning her around as he bolted in the opposite direction.

Way ahead of her he may have been, but he was the only one. Joe was staring blankly at the snow until Blue reached up with one floppy ear and tugged on his shirt. "Bow bow, Bow!"

"Right," he mumbled, then seemed to snap out of it. "Yeah, right behind you!"

The snow didn't seem to be intensifying quite as rapidly as it had outside the picture; the group easily made it back to the depot, where there wasn't a single flurry in sight. Still... Velma stopped just inside the garage and looked back. The wind was starting to whistle violently through the trees just behind them, and the temperature had begun to noticeably drop.

Joe, who'd nearly made it to the inner door, turned around and grabbed her by the sleeve. "Velma. Inside."

It didn't take a whole lot of encouragement for her to go along with him. "I'm guessing weather doesn't usually follow you into pictures." Despite his earlier reaction, the question was probably worth asking. For something to say if nothing else.

"No," he confirmed, casting one last worried look behind them before closing the door. "This is... is..."

"Bow," Blue offered.

"Yeah. Strange."

"Ro ridding."

Velma nodded and looked around, though there was nothing interesting to look at. The depot was getting familiar. At least they were indoors, which meant they were in much better shape than the first time it had started snowing.

Of course, the snow was picking up outside, just as it had before. It was one thing to look at the situation logically, and it was another thing entirely to look out the window. Looking out the window was worrisome. That, and she was starting to notice the slightest chill creeping _into_ the building.

_Something tells me a complex in the middle of a tropical rain forest isn't going to have a furnace_.

"So what do we do now?" Joe asked. He was kneeling next to Blue, scratching her ears, and looking suspiciously at the door as if he expected the snow to start pounding it in any moment. Which might not have been an entirely unreasonable fear.

"I guess all we can do is wait it out." It didn't sound too appealing. But what else was there?

* * *

Joe was pointedly avoiding looking at the window. It wasn't that he was afraid of snow; not in the least. Snow was great if he wasn't stranded in it. Which... yeah. Right now they were definitely stranded, no matter how he tried to look at it.

Perhaps sensing his unease, or possibly worried herself, Blue snuggled up against him. "Bow bow."

"Yeah, it is cold," he agreed softly. It seemed like the cold was starting to pierce the walls. Or maybe it was just coming in the window... despite himself he glanced up, took one look at the blur of green and mostly white outside, and decided it wasn't all too worth looking at after all. "I don't think this place was built for snow."

"No, I was thinking the same thing," Velma agreed. She was frowning thoughtfully—that seemed to be a typical expression. After all, she _was_ the designated smart one of Mystery Incorporated. "Let's try getting to the center of the building." He must've given her some kind of doubtful look, because she quickly corrected, "To the extent it has one."

"Sure." He gave Blue one more pat, then stood up. "What for?"

"It'll take longer for the cold to reach that far inside," she answered simply. "I have some matches left from the trap, we can set a fire if we need to." Rather than waiting for anyone to argue further, she just started walking, probably assuming they would follow. They _had_ been following her the whole time so far.

Joe saw no real reason to stop now, and with a shrug he and the dogs trooped after her.

Somewhere in the middle of their trip down the hallway, both dogs perked up, ears twitching. Blue gave a few curious barks; Scooby whimpered. "Relma? Roe? Rid one of rou ray romething?"

The humans exchanged confused looks. "Wasn't me."

"Me either..."

"Bowbow bow," Blue commented. _Wasn't them_. Unless Joe was much mistaken, she actually looked back at the nearest window for a moment.

Straining, he thought he _might_ have heard a whisper. Maybe. It was pretty difficult to hear anything subtle with the way the wind was starting to shriek outside... and inside, considering that some of the windows they were passing now were cracked. "What was it, Blue?"

"Bowbow bowbow." _Someone talking._

"What'd they say?"

All that got him was a questioning bark. _Okay, fair enough_. She probably couldn't hear very well right now either. And surely she had to be imagining it. Voices, here? Maybe she was just mistaking the sound of the wind... it could do funny things.

The closest they could get to an interior room seemed to be some sort of office. With carpet. _Great_ place for a fire, really, but at least there weren't any windows. Velma started rooting through the cabinets, then seemed to think better of it. "Here." She produced a metal garbage can from beneath the desk. "This should work."

"Fantastic."

Velma ignored his lack of enthusiasm and started gathering paper. Even though he understood it now, he still couldn't help thinking she was taking this far too much in stride. Couldn't she at least act a little bit worried? Then he noted Scooby cowering in a corner, looking ten times more uneasy than he felt himself.

_Well, I guess someone here has to keep their composure. ...Though Blue seems okay. _

Blue was actually digging around in one of the cabinets that Velma had opened. She'd retrieved some blank paper but didn't seem satisfied with that. "Blue, what're you looking for?"

"Bowbow!"

_Oh_. He chuckled. "I uh... don't think there's going to be any crayons here." Reaching into his pocket, he found the pen he'd been using to draw clues. "Want this?"

"Bow bow. Bow bowbow." _No thanks. No colors_.

Yeah, she was just fine.

Velma finally seemed pleased with what she'd gathered in the trash can, and struck a match. The howling outside seemed to intensify immediately, almost as if in response...

She dropped the match into the can, and as a cheery fire sprang up, a horrible scream sounded from the outside. And a voice. Definitely a voice, carried on the winds

_"This will not stand, defilers!"_

"Bow bow bow!" Blue yelped, jumping into Joe's arms.

"Reah, rhat rhe said!" Scooby agreed, leaping into Velma's.

_"There is no escape!"_

Out in the hallway, there was a roar of shattering glass. Immediately an icy wind began blasting in around the door, carrying a few snowflakes along with it.

_Well. This just keeps getting better and better_.

* * *

"You know? This just got a whole lot easier."

Velma felt like she should be frightened, watching the snow start drifting into the office, but something about the snow _talking_ was steadying her. Suddenly, this clearly wasn't just a blizzard. This was a... a... well, it hadn't exactly introduced itself, but the name wasn't that big a deal. A snow demon? Sure. A snow demon.

Weather was weather. Nothing to be done for it. But snow demons Velma could deal with.

"How do you figure it's _easier_?" Joe protested.

"Because it's talking. I have a theory..." She looked at the garbage can. Lighting the match—and worse, setting the fire—seemed to be what had really angered the snow demon outside. "I don't think this thing likes fire."

"What _thing_?" he asked blankly.

"The snow demon." He gave her a confused look. "The blizzard's _talking to us_, Joe, this isn't a normal meteorological phenomenon. There's something out there controlling the snow."

Joe and Blue exchanged glances. "Bow bow bow bow." _Makes sense to me_.

"I guess..."

Velma deposited Scooby on the floor as gently as she could, then returned her attention to the trash can. She really ought to test this theory before she did anything rash. Her first inclination was to ask Joe for help, but he didn't look like he was planning to let go of Blue any time soon—probably not until it stopped snowing, at this rate.

"Scooby, I need your help."

"Ro ray. Rot ronna re rait."

"I don't need you to be bait. I just need you to open the door for a minute while I push this," she pointed to the trash can full of fire, "outside."

This won her _three_ very confused looks. "Ruh? ...Rokay..."

"What're you thinking?" Joe asked, sounding a bit concerned at this new plan.

"Trust me for now. I'll explain if it works."

Joe proved he wasn't one of the gang by glowering at her rather than just accepting this, and kept it up until Blue licked his face. "Bowbow bow bow bow bowbow, Bow."

Despite herself, Velma grinned. _Thanks for the vote of confidence, Blue. _"Okay, come on Scooby." She walked over to the can and moved over to pick it up, but suddenly Blue gave an urgent bark and jumped out of Joe's arms, running over to a cabinet on the far wall.

"Blue...?"

The puppy clambered up the shelves and pulled out a large strip of something cream-colored and fuzzy. Carpet scraps, Velma realized. "Bow! Bow bow!" she barked reproachfully as she carried the scraps over to Velma.

_Fire. Don't touch_.

"Good idea," Velma complimented, wrapping the carpet around the garbage can. Blue gave a wide grin before retreating to stand next to Joe.

Even through the carpet, Velma could feel how hot the can had gotten, and was extremely grateful the puppy had been thinking about such practical details. It was easy to lose sight of such things when there was a snow demon knocking on your door... literally. Scooby was crouched by the door, one paw on the doorknob, waiting for a signal.

"Now!"

The big dog yanked the door open and Velma half pushed, half threw the can of fire out into the hallway. She barely had a chance to look at what was out there—but there was definitely a foot of snow inside the building, and it was building fast.

"Close it!"

"Rot it!"

Once the fire was out it only took a second or two for the screaming to start, which was exactly what she'd expected... it sounded somehow familiar, but she put that aside.

* * *

It bothered Joe more than he wanted to let on that the thing outside was screaming. It sounded... hurt. Of course, it also seemed to be trying to kill them, so maybe he shouldn't be too worried about its comfort. Still...

Velma nodded with some satisfaction, waiting for the screaming to die down before trying to speak over it. "We're dealing with something that doesn't like fire. Makes sense, if it's a _snow_ demon... so if we want to get rid of it, we're going to need a lot more fire."

She said it like it was so simple. Where did she expect to find a lot of fire in the middle of a blizzard? All they had were a few matches left over from the trap—

_Wait. The trap._ The trap which had involved an explosive device... made from a small tank of gas... which had been retrieved from the very large tanks of gas just outside... _oh no. No, she can't be suggesting that. Except she probably can._

"No."

"Ro," said Scooby, who looked like he'd just come to the same conclusion.

"Bow!" Blue chimed in.

Joe knew what was coming before Velma even said it, and she didn't disappoint him. "Do you guys have a better idea?"

"I have a better idea than blowing ourselves up," he countered, sounding a good deal more confident than he felt. "_Not_ blowing ourselves up." Even as he said it, he knew that he couldn't actually win this argument. No, there weren't any other options coming to mind. Yes, the last time they'd decided explosions were necessary, it had worked perfectly.

...This was going to be a slightly less controlled situation, though.

Velma was giving him a sympathetic look. "I don't really like it either," she admitted, "but we can't stay like this. That thing's going to reach us eventually... the hallway out there is already half full of snow." Then she frowned. "We're going to have to go out the other way. I didn't hear any windows breaking on that side."

"Okay." Joe signaled to Blue, who cheerfully jumped up and perched on his shoulders. He was definitely not going along with this if he couldn't account for the puppy at every moment. "I think we'd better figure out exactly what we're doing before we go out there."

"Right." She nodded. "We need to get some more rope. Shouldn't be an issue; it was all over the place in here. Then..." A frown. "We can set up a fuse like when we were making that hole for the dimetrodon, but it's going to take a little more work this time. The rope won't burn very well once it's out in the snow."

"Roh rell, re'll rave to ro romething relse," Scooby suggested brightly.

"No, we can make it work. Just soak the rope in some of the gasoline first."

Joe and Scooby glanced at each other. Joe was all ready to start arguing again, but Scooby shook his head, looking resigned. "Rot rorth rit," the big dog mumbled, holding his head in his paws.

_Great_. He sighed. "You're sure that's not going to backfire? Literally?" When Velma just shrugged, he decided he'd probably only regret pressing the issue—actually, it should probably be a good sign if she wasn't promising that nothing could go wrong.

Reassuring? No. But at least it meant she still had a grip on reality.

He almost started to ask what they would do if this plan didn't work. Then he thought better of it.

* * *

The supply depot had plenty of random junk lying around, and much of it was useful. But just like the building probably didn't have a heating system, experience so far told Velma there weren't going to be any closets full of winter clothing handy.

Fair enough. They'd get cold.

Most of the windows in the complex were still intact, as she'd hoped, but by now enough snow was coming in the cracks to make it uncomfortable as they looted some new rope and started searching for a door. It was important to come out as close to the tanks as possible; they weren't quite in whiteout conditions, but it was getting there.

That and it wouldn't do to be numb from the chill before even _reaching_ the tanks.

By the time they reached what seemed to be the most promising door, Velma doubted it was much warmer inside the building than outside. Yet another good reason to get this over with quickly. "Everyone ready?"

"More or less."

"Ro."

"Bowbow."

Under these circumstances that was all she could ask for, so she reached up and hit the electronic lock.

Nothing happened.

"...Really? We're going to find the one working lock in the building _now_?" Velma scowled at the mechanism, feeling very much as if she'd just been personally insulted, and took another swing at it. Still no luck. "Okay, I guess we'll have to try a different door. Any suggestions?"

"This way." Joe motioned for them to follow, and after a couple of corners they stumbled into a snowdrift. Inside. It became immediately apparent where the snow had come from: the door in front of them seemed to barely be hanging on its hinges. "This is probably the best we're gonna get."

"Probably," Velma agreed. "Scoob, make like Daphne."

Scooby cocked his head. "Rakeup?"

"No, no. The _other_ make like Daphne."

"Roh, rokay." The big dog backed up, eying the door carefully, then crouched on the other side of the hallway. "Scooby-dooby-doooo!" With that he charged forward at full speed, launched into the air, and planted a flying roundhouse kick squarely in the center of the door. With a squeal, the door came completely off its hinges and collapsed to the snow-covered cement.

Blue gave the Great Dane a wide-eyed look of admiration, and Joe offered a thumbs up. "Nice!"

Though he'd surely have been content to bask in their compliments a bit longer, Scooby couldn't do much about the temperature, and when he started shivering everyone seemed to remember that it was freezing and they had work to do.

_"No escape!"_ the wind mocked as Velma set to work, opening the valve and letting gas pour out into the snow. Waiting a moment to be sure it wouldn't freeze—there was _no_ reason for gasoline to freeze in this situation, but that didn't mean much—she retrieved the rope from Joe and let it start soaking.

"Ugh. This'll be a minute."

"Rigures." Scooby moved up and nudged her side, his presence offering at least a little bit of warmth against the biting snow.

Despite his cynicism she grinned, reaching up to scratch him behind the ears. "Thanks, Scooby."

Joe was already uneasy about this plan, and Scooby wasn't taking it much better, so Velma decided not to mention the one point that really worried her. She had no idea how much gas was actually in the tanks—but could reasonably suspect that the one they were opening, at the very least, would empty out in short order. Gasoline vapors were far more combustible than gasoline itself. Without knowing exactly what quantities they were dealing with, it was impossible to predict just how big the explosion would be.

Big enough to make the snow demon think twice, no doubt. Reaching a safe distance, though, was going to come down to erring on the side of caution... like only stopping when they ran out of rope.

It was desperate, but in the end, weren't these plans always desperation? The gang was always trying to save something... it didn't matter if it was just a dog show or a golfing tournament. It didn't matter if it was their reputations or their lives. Someone would do something desperate because that was how they rolled.

Something desperate, like beating up a robotic clown with a golf club. Something desperate, like dumping a bucket of water on a ghostly witch's head. Something desperate... like leading an army of tourists to save their friend from a curse.

And it worked because it had to work. Because they made it work. Every time.

Velma shook herself out of her thoughts when the fumes started to get overpowering. The rope was ready. Already a bit clumsy from the cold, she tied one end off on the tank supports, then took the other end and nodded to her team.

Her _team_. It felt good to think that.

"Let's go!"

* * *

Joe let Blue out of his sight exactly once, for exactly six seconds, while they were getting across the fence. He and Velma had been climbing over.

_Climbing when you can't feel your hands. That takes skill. ...Or luck. Probably luck_.

Scooby had burrowed beneath the fence instead, and being a very intelligent puppy, Blue had opted for the tunnel. Hence the six seconds. And they'd been a pretty long six seconds.

Velma was carrying the rope, which probably would've reeked if it weren't for all the snow and wind getting in the way. At least the blizzard had that one redeeming feature. Wait... not a blizzard, a snow demon. Okay. Joe could probably wrap his brain around that.

...No, maybe not. He'd have been a lot more comfortable if she'd just let him believe the blizzard was talking.

It seemed like they hadn't gone near as far as he'd hoped for when Velma pulled up short. "I think that's it." She held up the rope and gave it a tug; it'd been pulled completely taut.

"So we're at the end of our rope?"

He couldn't tell for certain in the almost-whiteout, but he thought she scowled at him. Alternately it might've been a smile. It was _really_ hard to see through the snow. "Yeah, something like that." She took a step closer to him. "This isn't going to take long to burn. We really doused that rope."

They certainly had. "Yeah."

"I want you and Blue to get a head start on us."

Joe hesitated. "Wait... you want us to just take off without you?" He knew Velma was not some neighbor kid who needed the repetition, but this was even worse than a snow demon. There was no way he'd just heard her correctly.

"That's what I said."

Or maybe he had. "Absolutely not. We can't just..." He trailed off rather than backing up his protest, realizing he wasn't really sure which component bothered him more. Leaving Velma and Scooby, after they'd all been in this mess together the whole time? That didn't sound too attractive. Forging out into the snow alone? That was even less attractive.

Although... he looked at Blue, who was huddled up against his leg and shivering._ Not alone. Not this time... don't argue. It's not about you. You have something to protect this time, now _do it.

Velma was just watching him, silently, letting him wrestle with the question. There really _was_ only one possible answer, and he didn't even have to wonder what Steve would do.

"Blue?"

"Bow?"

"We're going to go ahead a bit. Come on."

The puppy shot a curious look between him and Velma, then back at Scooby. "Bowbow." She sounded a little hesitant as well, and Joe wondered if she fully understood what was happening. He kind of hoped not. Either way... she stood up, stretched, and shook herself vigorously in a mostly vain attempt to dry off, then trotted up in front of him. "Bowbow." _Ready_.

At least that made one of them.

Joe looked at Velma, who was looking back at him with what was probably a very serious expression; she offered a reassuring nod. "Go on, Joe. We'll be right behind you."

She knew what she was doing. Everything had worked out so far, hadn't it? Maybe it was the snow that was making him hesitate... or maybe he was just too stuck on this being the outside. It was hard to believe in people on the outside. But Velma was different.

Or was the fact that she was different why he didn't want to leave? He forced that thought aside. This wasn't the time.

"Be careful," he muttered lamely, and forced himself to turn away.

* * *

Velma watched Joe and Blue disappear into the snow, shivering herself as Scooby came up behind her and gave her a sloppy lick. "You think I did the right thing?"

"Reah. ...Ran Ri ro rith rem?"

She giggled. If he'd really meant that he would've asked quite a bit earlier. "I'm going to need you with me, so you can sniff them out once this is over." She shivered against the frigid winds, and he reached up and put an arm around her shoulders. "...And for that," she amended, smiling.

How long to give them? A minute or two? She was less worried about the tanks themselves than the rope; things could get pretty interesting when she actually lit it, which was why she'd sent them ahead. If something _did_ go wrong... she didn't want them there. Somehow they were both far too innocent to be trapped in this mess.

Innocent. It was a funny word. Velma would never have really thought about it before, but there was nothing at all innocent about the gang... not even Scooby. Purely good, perhaps, but not innocent. So many of those monsters—the real ones, not the masked ones—had met fairly gruesome fates. And then there'd been Ben...

_Ben_. She shuddered, this time not from the cold. _Full circle, then?_ He was the one who'd taught her not to trust anyone who wasn't part of the gang. Going downhill from there had gotten her here. Ben was the beginning. And he'd died in fire.

Fire. Right.

She pulled out the matchbook. "When we get out of here, Scoob, I'm going to have to have a long talk with you and the gang..." Though she said it to him, it was really for her own benefit. "Don't let me forget about it, okay?"

He gave her a curious look, but didn't ask. "Rokay."

Straining to see through the snow told her nothing—every last trace of purple and blue had long since vanished among the trees. Even without the snow they might not have been visible. "Think that's enough time?"

"Robably."

Just as well. Her hands were becoming very numb, and striking a match wasn't really an act for the dexterity-challenged. Which might be a problem. She had three matches left, and fumbled the first one despite her best efforts.

Rubbing her hands together for at least a little bit of warmth, she managed to light the second one, much to the snow demon's displeasure.

_"That won't save you!" _the winds hissed, picking up around her, snuffing the match out before she could get to the rope._ "Nothing will save you!"_

"You're not the first monster to tell us that," Velma muttered grimly. "And you're not going to be the last." Striking the final match she quickly cupped it in her other hand, shielding it from the winds, which lashed at her violently as she knelt next to the rope. "Scooby, get ready..."

"Ready," he confirmed.

No way was she actually going to touch the rope. That would just be silly. But she didn't need to... the vapors rising off their makeshift fuse would do just fine. She caught the faintest scent of gasoline, nodded, and let the match fall.

"Run!"

Scooby didn't need to be told twice. Whirling around, Velma followed, and they ran—for the few seconds they could.

* * *

Somewhere after losing sight of Velma and Scooby, Joe had stopped and picked Blue up from where she was running next to him. Carrying the puppy slowed him down some, but that didn't matter. His sense of direction was bad enough in the blinding snow—he couldn't even be certain they were still running away from the tanks. The worst thing that could possibly happen right now was losing track of Blue.

Well... okay, the _worst_ thing that could possibly happen was probably that something would go wrong with this plan, and the tanks would fail to go off. Which was... interesting. When Velma had first started mapping it out, the idea had seemed reckless and insane. It was no less reckless and insane now that they were locked into it, of course.

Matter of fact, he was pretty sure that much earlier in the night—when they'd been exploring and his gravest concern was a missing puppy—he'd entertained precisely this thought. That the tanks were solid because it would be really, really bad if they were to explode.

So now the only thing worse than the tanks going off was the tanks not going off. Great.

How would they know if it didn't work out, anyway? It would be pretty obvious if the tanks blew. If they didn't, though... _how long do we wait before going back? Or do we even go back? Maybe we should just keep running until it isn't snowing anymore._ The blizzard _did_ seem to be thinning out as they moved, but he had a sneaking suspicion that if they stopped it would follow.

And what if the explosion didn't kil—no, he wasn't going to use the word kill—_stop_ the demon? He wasn't sure. But there was one thing he definitely needed to take care of, no matter whether this worked perfectly or failed utterly.

"Blue, do you think you can find where we skidooed in?"

"Bow bow," she answered without hesitation. _Of course_.

"If this big explosion goes off, I want you to run back there. Get out. Don't stop, don't wait for anything. Just get out and get home."

"Bow? Bow bow bowbow bow?"

"No, not me either!" His voice was probably sharper than it needed to be, but he'd never had much need to actually act like an authority figure before. "I'll be fine, I can handle myself. You just worry about getting _you_ home. Alright?" His command tone had the helpful side effect of making him sound much more confident than he felt.

Protecting Blue was the most important thing he had to do. She didn't need to be caught up in this. Never had. She was smaller and faster than him; her chances alone were better, just as they had been when she'd been ducking the dimetrodon... she would be fine. She always was.

But she wasn't answering him. "Blue? Got it?"

Whatever she started to bark was lost as the winds picked up, the shrieking of the storm piercing his eardrums painfully. Blue yelped and he leaned in, shielding her as best he could... and then it got worse.

Velma's plan definitely hadn't failed.

The explosion was deafening, louder than anything he'd heard in his life. A soreness in his throat told him he'd screamed, but try as he might he couldn't hear it. Heat lashed out from behind them, the blast wave striking in full force—he stumbled forward and fell, still holding Blue, hoping at least _she_ was missing out on most of this.

At first, all Joe really noticed was the snow, vaporizing around him without even having the decency to melt first. Then the pain registered.

Pain?

Well, if he could feel pain he wasn't dead yet. That was something.

His body was on fire—from all he'd heard, he imagined the sensation must be something like sunburn. Very bad sunburn. He'd never been sunburned before, and resolved that if they made it out of this, he would never argue with Mrs. Pepper about sunblock again. For an instant he dared to hope this would be the worst of it, then he took his first choking gasp of superheated air.

Immediately the pain dulled, because the inferno in his lungs was the only thing he could focus on, and he only managed to bite back another scream because he knew that would make it worse.

Something else hit him. Literally. For a moment it felt like a crushing force was trying to rip him from his spot on the ground. Only a moment, though, because then it succeeded and he was flying. No. His arms tightened around Blue. _They_ were flying. Not that it was as pleasant or controlled as the word indicated; more accurate to say they were hurtling through the air, a rag doll with his rag dog.

Right. There was the rest of the shock wave. He couldn't breathe, but he could _see_. There was no snow to be found anymore—he supposed that was a plus. Not that it probably mattered at this point. They were going to meet gravity soon and it wasn't going to be pretty.

Weren't they?

"Bow bow bow... bow babow..."

"Blue?" He had no idea how he'd gasped the word out, and instantly regretted wasting precious oxygen doing so. That had to have been his imagination supplying the sound, she surely had not just barked the skidoo rhythm as the explosion carried them away.

But they were still flying...


	7. Into the Distance

**Winter Shadows**  
Chapter 7: Into the Distance

* * *

Everything was on fire. They should have been falling to the ground, but the ground wasn't there, only more fire. The trees were gone, the sky was shattering to reveal still more flame behind it. And he was weightless, the fire blazing over him but not seeming to burn, as if he had become a part of the fire himself.

_Is it over?_

The fire itself was shattering. Taking on shapes somewhere below them. The embers shifted, twisting into what first looked like a maze, but as the walls continued to rise and take shape he realized he was looking at a city. Parts of it were off... the colors clashed blindly, the textures were all wrong. He wanted to move, to get a better look, but he seemed to have no control over his body.

_I know this place._

Trying to close his eyes he found them closed already. No, his sense of sight had nothing to do with this. They were surrounded by chaos, a chaos that was at once terrifying and comforting, because it always meant the same thing. The boundary between imagination and reality—a chaos that led to wonder. Or even better, a chaos that led home.

_This doesn't make sense. But this never makes sense._

Falling. Gravity was reasserting itself, claiming domain over even the twilight where fire could build cities and worlds were as ethereal as thoughts. There was nothing he could do about the falling; what was it they said about flying? Throw yourself at the ground and miss? He wasn't going to miss.

_Hang in there. This is no time to panic._

Everything was becoming washed out, shifting again, tongues of white flame lashing upward as they fell. He felt it washing over them, a searing heat that numbed him until he could no longer distinguish it from piercing cold. Dimly he thought he felt the ground strike—though from _above_, that was odd—and if he didn't know better he'd have guessed they were once again in the outside world, surrounded by snow.

_Snow..._

He _was_ lying in the snow, clutching Blue as if both their lives depended on it, and perhaps that wasn't so far off. Gathering all his strength, he tried to move.

Pain shot through him and he blacked out.

* * *

Velma found herself sprawled on her face in two feet of snow, which was a _terrible_ place to be, and jumped up shivering. _Jinkies_. The explosion hadn't been so bad, but what had happened afterward... she kept trying to grasp it and couldn't. Every time she thought she remembered something it slipped away. And she had felt that before—one other lost moment, not so very long ago. The moment when they'd jumped into the picture.

Looking around, she could see the vague outlines of buildings through the driving snow. No trees, no jungle, and certainly no fire. Just a lot of buildings.

"Scooby?"

Shifting beside her, and a large canine head popped out of the snow. "Relma!" He looked around and grimaced. "Ridn't rork?"

"Worked too well, I think. We're not in the picture anymore." The snow on the outside seemed to have let up a little bit since they left, actually. It wasn't a _complete_ whiteout now.

Of course, she had no way of knowing if the snow demon was still out there, and wasn't about to bet against it.

"Row?"

"I don't know how. We'd have to ask Joe and Blue..." Velma paused. Surely the other two had made it back out as well? They _must_ have. But looking around, she didn't see anyone else, nor any telltale lumps of snow where a person and his puppy might have landed. "We need to find them."

"Ron it!" Scooby started sniffing the air, a determined look on his face. After a few moments he pointed off to her right. "Rhat ray!"

They'd been walking for less than a minute when Velma heard a truly beautiful sound. Barking. "Blue!"

"Bowbow?"

"Blue! Is Joe with you?"

"Bow bowbow," Blue called back. _He's asleep. _

_Asleep?_ A chill shot through Velma that had nothing to do with the cold, and she started to move faster, Scooby right on her heels. "We're coming! Keep talking so we can follow your voice, okay?"

There was a brief hesitation, then Blue obediently began barking again. After a few moments Velma, at a loss to understand the words, was at least able to discern a tune; the puppy was singing Jingle Bells.

And why _not_ Jingle Bells, really? Though she and Scooby certainly weren't dashing through all this snow.

Following Blue's singing brought them to a small clearing in the snow, one that reminded Velma a little too much of an impact crater. It didn't seem logical. She'd sent them ahead, why would they have been hit _harder_ by the blast that she and Scooby had been? Unless they'd gotten turned around amidst the trees and the falling snow...

Joe was sprawled in the center of the clearing. Blue had been curled up next to him until Velma came in sight, at which point she jumped up, tail wagging frantically. "Bowbow! Bowbow!"

"Rue!" Scooby raced forward and licked Blue's face, then looked at Joe and winced. "Ruh roh..."

"Yeah," Velma agreed, kneeling next to Joe. "Ruh roh for sure." She checked for a pulse and found a strong one, which started to loosen up the knot in her stomach. "Blue, did he hit his head or something?"

"Bow bow bow? Bowbow bow, bow bow bowbow bow." She gestured expansively. "Bow bow bow, bow babow! Bow bow bow bowbow." Most of that had gone by too fast, but something about not being able to see because he was holding her, and something about falling funny. So probably yes.

The intelligent thing to do would be to go find medical attention. Also entirely impossible when they were stranded in a snow-demon-induced blizzard. Barring that, leaving him in the snow wasn't a good plan. Taking a deep breath and hoping she wasn't making a mistake, she reached out and shook his shoulder gently.

"Joe? Joe, wake up."

_He's got to wake up... right?_

* * *

_RIIIIIIINNNNNNNG_.

The deafening ringing in his ears was the first thing Joe noticed, followed moments later by a stabbing pain in his head. _Ugh_... the ringing was no mystery, but why so loud? Maybe it was a migraine, though he wasn't prone to those. Either way though, the ringing was getting to be miserable.

"Lighten up Tickety, I'm awake..." The words felt sluggish coming out. He tried to sit up, wondering why it was so incredibly cold in the bedroom, and the ringing got worse. That was his first sign something was wrong.

The second sign was when he opened his eyes and saw nothing but searing, blinding white.

"Joe?" The voice mercifully pushed the ringing aside for a moment, but it wasn't Tickety. "Joe, can you hear me?"

As the ringing began to fade, the white blur was starting to resolve itself into images... still mostly white, but he could make out three colored blobs in front of him. One was blue and obviously Blue. _The others?_ He waited for his vision to sharpen a bit more and could make out the others: a large brown dog, and a girl in an orange sweater who was peering at him through thick glasses.

He knew them... _wait_. _Scooby. Velma._

The events of the past several hours flooded back to him in an instant, accompanied by a new jolt of pain splitting through his head and neck. "Agh! ...Okay... yeah... I'm all here... ouch."

"Take it easy," Velma advised, moving around behind him. "You're a mess. Good thing there's plenty of ice around... brace yourself." Before he could ask exactly what he was bracing for, she took a handful of snow and pressed it to the back of his head.

Joe yelped as piercing cold lanced through him, along with another wave of blinding pain. "Was that necessary?" Yelling didn't really help his headache either and he took a deep breath, trying to stay calm despite the circumstances.

"Give it a minute."

Oddly, when she pulled away the pain seemed to have dulled somewhat. "Oh... thanks, I think."

She laughed, not without sympathy. "You're bleeding a little, but it isn't too bad. When we get out of this you'd better get that looked at though."

_Get out of this? Oh. Yeah. Get out of this._ He looked around at the snow, then focused on Blue. "Are you okay, Blue?"

"Bow!" She jumped up on his lap, planting her paws on his chest, and started wildly licking his face.

_Whew_. At least he'd accomplished that much.

"Do you think you can stand?" Velma asked gently; she didn't sound like she wanted to have to say it. Given that they were surrounded by two feet of snow, it wasn't as if he could blame her. But it was a pretty good question.

"Well, let's find out..."

Trying to get his legs beneath him was rewarded with a blaze of vertigo—it probably also hurt, but he was getting used to that—and he was pretty sure he saw a few stars on the fringes of his vision. That amused him. _Even back home you don't see _actual_ stars after cracking your head_. He felt Scooby pushing his side to steady him, and managed to get mostly upright.

More dizziness, this time coupled with a bit of nausea to add insult to injury. This almost didn't seem worth it.

"Bow bow, Bow?"

Or maybe it was. "Yeah. Yeah, I'm good. Where to?"

* * *

_Ask me an easy one, why doesn't he_. Joe seemed to be good at that.

Truthfully, Velma had no idea where to go from here; she'd been concerned with making sure everyone was in one piece. The snow was starting to pick up again, not that visibility had been great to begin with, and she had a sneaking feeling they'd be getting yelled at soon. Something about there being no escape.

Which didn't sound too far off right now.

Well, standing around was worse than moving. That wasn't up for debate. "Step one, start walking. Step three, stop the snow demon."

"What's step two?"

"Still working on that."

To her surprise, Joe shrugged as if this were perfectly acceptable, then winced as if shrugging were about the worst thing he could've done. "Oww..." She supposed he _wasn't_ in any condition to argue, at that.

"Bow bow bow," Blue observed. _Lots of snow_. A few inches had piled up by now in the small clear spot they'd landed in, but that was nothing compared to the ground around them. The puppy was staring wide-eyed at a wall of white taller than she was. "Bow... bowbowbow!" She took a flying leap and disappeared into the snow, then poked her head up and shook it off. "Bow." _Deep_.

"Yeah," Joe agreed, and was probably going to offer to carry her—which could not possibly go well for him—when Scooby trotted up and nudged Blue with his nose.

"Rall aroard!" he ordered. She considered this for a moment, then barked happily and clambered onto the much larger dog's back.

"Bow bow!"

"Rou're relcome."

Moving wasn't difficult, all things considered. Moving with anything resembling a purpose? That was another story. Velma kept trying to seek out a landmark, but she wasn't getting anything better than some blurry outlines which seemed to waver in the near-whiteout. After a few minutes she was starting to wonder if they were going in circles.

"You know, we probably should've at least run into a wall by now."

"You'd think," Joe agreed.

Blue had moved up and was perched with her paws on Scooby's head, looking around as if she could actually see anything. And maybe she could. "Bow bow!" _That way!_

Under normal circumstances, Velma would've asked something silly there, like _why that way?_ Or maybe _what do you see?_ Right now it didn't seem pertinent. A direction was better than no direction. "That way it is!"

Right about then, the winds began howling. Much worse than inside of the poster, even—Velma could hardly hear herself think, let alone catch anything her companions might have been saying. Just about the only thing the wind didn't block out was an infuriated roar from the snow demon.

_"NOW I'M REALLY ANGRY!"_

Wonderful.

* * *

With two feet of snow on the ground, and more coming down at a pretty fair clip, Joe could hardly be expected to be watching where he was going. His focus was divided between two things: watching where Blue was pointing, and trying not to fall over from dizziness.

Falling over with outside help? Nothing to be done for it.

He tripped over something, something thin and vertical and entirely buried in the snow. Keeping his balance was out of the question; he settled for making sure he didn't hit his head. Again. His hands hit asphalt, but he was sure what he'd tripped over had been some kind of post. A post in the road?

Surely not. On the side of the road?

That didn't seem to make a lot of sense either. A signpost would be much too tall to _trip_ over, but what else... no, it didn't matter. _Keep moving_. He tried to get up and his headache fiercely protested.

"Easy, Joe." Velma's words were muffled from the wind, barely audible, as she and Scooby stopped close to him. "Give it a minute."

Yeah. Take it easy. This was just a walk in the park.

Well, they _had_ been in a park earlier.

Letting curiosity take over as he waited for the pain to subside, Joe turned and started to dig through the snow, looking for whatever he'd hit. Sure enough, a post. Just kind of sitting there on the side of the road. Odd.

But on closer examination it wasn't _just_ a post. The wood was ornately worked, and it looked like something on the top had been broken off—there were splinters and a small notch on one side. That made even less sense. He reached down and pushed the snow away from the base, shielding the area with his body before it could be covered in whiteness again.

Something shining. A plaque. _This memorial is dedicated to the Johnston family, which perished here during the Blizzard of 1988._ There were other words, he guessed them to be Latin, beneath that. But they suddenly didn't matter.

_A gas tank, a wheel, and a cross..._

Feeling around in the snow he found another piece of wood, L-shaped and splintered. Same color and working as the post sticking out of the ground.

_A vehicle and a cross..._

Joe remembered now. There had been the scream... but right before that... something else. Tires squealing. It had seemed the least important thing at the time. Now? Not so much. Bracing himself against the cold and vertigo he swept back as much snow as he could, and for perhaps three seconds he could see the asphalt he knew was there. And more importantly, the skid marks he'd guessed must be there.

The snow covered it again in seconds, but those seconds were all he needed. It all made sense now.

"A vehicle _hitting_ a cross," he whispered.

How she heard him over the shrieking winds, he couldn't imagine, but Blue barked a confirmation. "Bow bow bow!"

A family that had died in a blizzard. Something controlling the snow. A vehicle hitting a cross. He could put the pieces together, but wasn't quite sure what to do with them. Other than, of course, to tell someone who _would_ know. "Velma! I found something!"

As she knelt next to him to look, Joe couldn't quite help humming to himself, the tune lost in the wind and the words something he would never dare voice.

_We fell on down, figured it out, what Blue's clues were all about... wow, you know what? It's still really cold_.

* * *

Velma read over the plaque several times, just to make sure she was seeing correctly. _Of course... not a demon. A ghost. _One that was quite right to be angry, if rather misdirecting that anger.

Though it explained where that _defilers_ comment in the jungle had come from.

So, how to calm an angry spirit whose memorial had been wrecked? There was definitely one easy possibility.

"We need to try to put this back together."

Joe raised an eyebrow. "That simple?"

"I don't know, but it's a start. Do you want to ask the blizzard how it feels first?" She probably sounded more sarcastic than necessary, but he didn't seem to mind. Of course, he was walking around with what was almost certainly a mild concussion... maybe he was beyond picking up on such things right now.

In any case, he started searching the snow for more pieces rather than answering her.

The dogs had jumped in already—in one case literally. Blue was all but swimming around in the snow, one ear poking up and reminding Velma very much of a periscope. At first glance it seemed like she was only interested in playing in the snow, but twice she popped up and handed over a piece of wood, so whatever she was doing was working.

So what next? Even if they got all the pieces, there was still the matter of putting the memorial back in _one_ piece. Frowning thoughtfully, Velma pulled out her eyeglass cleaning cloth. "Scoob, can you cut this into strips for me?"

"Ruh? ...Rokay, if rou ray so." The Great Dane's claws, honed on a slicing up a few thousand sandwiches, cut through the fabric easily, and he handed back several strips of blue cloth. "Row's rhat?"

"Perfect, thanks." A small sacrifice, and such. She started fitting pieces together, using the cloth strips to tie things into place. It wasn't going to be pretty and the smallest splinters couldn't possibly be replaced, but hopefully this would placate the spirit.

Was it her imagination, or were the winds actually starting to die down?

She ran out of cloth before they ran out of wood; someone had _really_ done a number on this poor memorial. There were two pieces left; fitting one in, she enlisted Joe to hold it in place, while she pushed the last fragment in. And... nothing happened.

For a moment.

The next moment, the entire world seemed to implode around them.

* * *

Joe wasn't quite sure how he ended up holding onto Velma, but Blue and Scooby were clinging to each other so it was probably okay. How else was he supposed to react, really? Having your surroundings come crashing down on your head wasn't something most people had experience dealing with.

Though he was sure he'd at least had one skidoo transition like that. Maybe.

It wasn't the world, he realized vaguely. It was just the snow, being drawn into the memorial like an unstoppable vortex. He made a mental note to explain this to Blue as being similar to a giant vacuum cleaner, should the need arise.

The implosion was over in about thirty seconds, and he and Velma let go of each other after exchanging very, very awkward looks.

"What just happened?" he asked, at a loss to say anything more intelligent.

"I think we fixed it," Velma observed, glancing at the memorial. Her jaw dropped.

Joe followed her gaze and had about the same reaction. "Th... I... yeah. Yeah, I think we did." The ornate cross was pristine. There was no sign of the splintered wreck it had been for most of the night, though he was sure there was still some cold emanating from it. Mostly noticeable because the air around them had warmed considerably.

Probably to about what it had been at midnight when they'd first come out here.

Looking around he realized the ground was dry. Two feet of snow vanishing was bad enough, but vanishing without a trace?

Velma seemed to share his thoughts, because her next words came very slowly. "That... that did just happen, right?"

"My headache says yes," Joe mumbled.

"Ri rhink so," Scooby chimed in.

"Bowbowbow." _Definitely_.

With a little effort and more than a little help, Joe managed to stand again. "Hey Blue."

"Bow?"

"Think you can find that poster we jumped into?" It wasn't relevant, it wasn't a good time... but he _really_ wanted to know what movie they'd just spent the night in. Just for the sake of knowing.

"Bow bow, bow bow!" She started to run off, then halted and looked back at him. He was not running. Absolutely not. The puppy interpreted his look correctly and slowed.

Thankfully, the alley wasn't too far away, but when Blue stopped and looked up at the wall she just let out a confused bark.

"...Okay then." Joe shook his head in disbelief and promptly regretted it.

The poster was shredded and burned, entirely unrecognizable. Yet there was no sign of fire anywhere else—no ash on the ground, no scorched or blackened brick behind it, nothing that might have indicated the poster's fate. Nothing but the poster itself.

But at least the obliterated poster was proof something had happened. That and the dizziness that kept gripping him every time he turned around.

It was late, and it was over.

"We should probably..." He trailed off as he realized Velma was saying the exact same thing, and she stopped when he stopped. They both grinned sheepishly and nodded. No sense voicing it when they both knew it was time to leave.

They scanned the night and tried to look at anything but each other.

* * *

"There," Velma pointed as she realized what she was seeing. "All night gas station, straight ahead."

"You're not gonna try to blow it up, are you?"

She shot Joe an indignant look, and Scooby chuckled. "Re's rot a roint, Relma."

"Yeah... yeah... I guess so. I promise I don't have any matches left, okay?"

"Bowbow."

Leaving Blue and Scooby outside, the humans entered the station and were greeted by a rather confused-looking old woman behind the counter. "Say, did you kids just see anything odd going on with the weather?"

Oh, there were so many ways to answer that... after exchanging looks that were mostly conspiratorial, but _could_ have been interpreted as puzzled, they both shook their heads. "Nope, sorry."

"Huh. I could've sworn I looked out and it was snowing a few minutes ago..." The woman shrugged. "What can I do for ya?"

Velma got her directions to the hotel, and Joe asked for directions to... the library? That seemed odd, but she supposed a landmark was a landmark. And she liked that choice of landmark. Departing the gas station, they retrieved the dogs. Or at least the one dog that was conscious. Blue was draped over Scooby's back, sound asleep.

Chuckling, Velma turned back to Joe, and paused where she ought to be saying goodbye. Something about just _leaving_ didn't seem quite right...

"Do you want us to walk you back?" she asked finally, awkwardly. "I mean, Blue looks pretty comfortable, and you probably have a concussion or something."

"No thanks, we'll be okay." Joe reached up and touched the back of his head self-consciously. "She's not a light sleeper and it's not too far." He sounded a little uneasy as well.

For a few moments they just stared at each other. Velma had an idea, but... _what's the worst that can happen?_ Just because she should know better than to ask that didn't mean she ever really would. "So, uh..." Forget subtlety. Subtlety was for suspects. "Does your world of talking alarm clocks have functioning telephones?"

He arched an eyebrow. "Matter of fact..."

* * *

Crossing the boundary was something Joe usually did on autopilot, though it was a little trickier with a sleeping puppy in his arms. He was exhausted and more than a little tense, and that was _without_ figuring out how to explain to Mr. Salt and Mrs. Pepper where they'd been all night... as he stepped back into the magical world, _his_ world, he could see the first hint of dawn on the horizon.

For a moment he just stopped and closed his eyes, waiting. There were things about this world... as if the magic could not abide such injuries, he already felt his headache starting to recede. Just to be sure, he gently set Blue in the grass and poked at the gash on his head.

No blood. As it ought to be.

Chances were pretty good he _had_ had a concussion, but like most wounds from the outside, that was left behind here.

Still...

There was a slip of paper in his pocket, with a few numbers scrawled on it. Correspondence wasn't one of his stronger points; he was busy, time slipped away too quickly. Velma had indicated a similar problem.

No surprise, really.

But the option was there... maybe they _would_ stay in touch.

Maybe was a good word.

* * *

_And it's done! Maybe.  
__Planning a sequel. But this one's done.  
__Thanks so much to everyone who's read, and reviewed!_


End file.
